The cool guy
by Souvenir
Summary: An offhand remark from a stranger on his first day in the city throws Roxas into the high energy situation of stalking, being stalked, and the whatmaycome therein. Rated for language. AU. This one might get involved.
1. An introduction

**a/n: So I'm basically throwing out most of what I know about writing and _running _with it for this fic. It's experimental for me, but I've never had a first chapter come so easily. No, the whole thing won't be told like this...you'll see what I mean.**

**I'd like to warn you that this will contain shounen ai and language. (Y'know...the bad kind of language.Of course it's _language..._cough)**

**Anyway. As a disclaimer I do not own Kingdom Hearts. **

**And in conclusion...if you're going to read this, then please leave me a review. Especially with this work, because I have no idea if it's good or crap or whatever. Thanks, hope you enjoy the read! **

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"God _dammit!"_

Were the two words that preceded the peculiar noise that an extremely heavy box makes when it falls on a person's sandaled feet. In this case, the victim and culprit of said action were one.

Which was actually pretty lucky for a hypothetical culprit, because this guy has a pretty sharp temper and a tongue to match.

This type of story doesn't normally feature the type of guy who was currently cursing his clumsiness and all makers of boxes to high hell, simultaneously dragging himself up five flights of steps to his new apartment.

But this type of story doesn't normally let people choose what happens to them either, and this guy certainly wasn't betting on the series of events about to crash around his ears.

This was the guy who graduated with a 4.0 from highschool and never studied for tests.

The guy who laughed at kids who read dirty magazines in study hall and got caught while he read dirty novels in class and got praised.

This guy is the one who stayed on the fringes of the "cool" group in school, never entering their territories because he had more disdain than jealousy in his body and he just didn't give a damn because the universe was too big for him to put up with all the shit that highschool revolved around.

Maybe you remember him. Maybe you think you know him.

Except that's all you do, is think----cause the truth is that _nobody _knows this guy, and quite frankly nobody _desires_ to know this guy.

He wasn't cool and he wasn't popular.

But secretly, everybody wanted to be him. Know why? Because in the midst of their silly romantic hormone-induced troubles, they sensed it---

The fact that this guy had no drama. No trauma. No complex group of friends. No backstabbers. No rumors. He was _above _all that craziness because he _wanted _to be above it, and they wanted to want it like he did.

In the back of his head, he probably knew it too.

Little does he know that it's what he _doesn't _know that's about to hurt him. The fact that a wrong word thrown in a wrong way to the wrong person can lead to the wrong situation _damn _quick. The fact that sometimes you don't _get _to choose who you obsess over. And the fact that these two facts put together just don't equal the same thing that they did back in highschool.

This guy didn't know it, but his personality wasn't quite as unique as he'd always perceived it to be. Almost. But not quite, not enough to satisfy the person who he would come to know.

This guy's name is Roxas.

And this is _his _story… no matter what anyone will try to tell you later.


	2. II

**a/n: Hullo, this is chapter two of _The cool guy. _Kingdom Hearts is copyright Disney and Square, and of these I am neither. **

**I hope you enjoy the chapter, and as always, please leave a review! **

* * *

**Chapter 2**

"Hello, Roxas speaking, who is this? Oh, mum, it's you. Why didn't you say so? Yeah, um….nearly done." Roxas lied easily, casting one eye around the room, where boxes and boxes lounged unopened. In the corner, away from all the others, he'd placed the evil box from last night.

"Yes, it was easy. _Mum. _I told you, I don't need any help. That's right. I'm going to start looking for a job today. See? Don't you feel better already? I know I do….. Do what? Mum! I already told you----I moved out because I need to be successful. Not to find a girlfriend. Yes.Yes, I agree. It would be nice to find a nice girl with whom I could have a nice life. That would be…._nice. _Oh, sorry, Mum, that's the door. Well I don't _know _who it could be. One must first _open _the door. No, that's not sarcasm, that's being practical. Yeah. Why don't, uh, why don't you call me in like…a week? No, mum, every day is hardly necessary….how much of my life do you honestly think can change in one week?"

And with those words Roxas put down the phone and sauntered over to the door. In the coming days, when he would realize that it was the last conversation he would have that had been perfectly normal, he would wish that he had stayed on just a little longer.

But it was not to be, and while lying about the bell would have been effective in getting his mother---whom though he loved dearly (most of the time) was a terrible nag---off the phone and more importantly to him, out of his ear, the doorbell had in fact rung and was still ringing.

Persistently.

This is what we call a turning point in Roxas's life. After opening that door he would be confronted and confused and finally curious.

It would be curiousity, after all, that would drag him down to the ground--- literally! All to search for the truth.

It should then be documented that instead of exploring his other options which included ignoring the sound, hiding in the cramped closet, or jumping out the window, he undid the chain lock without a second thought.

Admittedly---there was a slight hesitation in Roxas's hand as he reached for the door.

But it was in his nature to put this down as a minor occurrence and so it didn't stall him from turning the knob and pulling the door open.

"Hello?"

"Hello? _Hello?!_ I think you're rotting under the floorboards somewhere and all you have to say, Mister Holier-than-Thou, is bloody hello? Where the hell is my rent? I'll say it twice---since last time I obviously wasn't screaming loud enough---in little bits so maybe it'll get through your thick-as-hell skull. Cause I'm feeling generous today. You know? Thought I'd stroll over, nice and easy like. So. Where. The. Fuck. Is. My. _Rent?!"_

Roxas watched the spectacle with his mouth open. "I….hey, why aren't you looking at me?"

The man in front of him was adamantly facing not the door, but the wall. Roxas took a tiny step backwards.

"_You know very well why I'm not fucking looking at you!"_

"Um." Roxas tried again. "I—I already put down the first payment in the mail. So, uh, yeah…"

Roxas wondered to himself if this was some kind of joke they played on new tenants. If it was, it wasn't amusing.

"What? Wait a second---you sound funny. You got a cold? Well, it serves you right! I hope you get so sick you can't _stand!_ Bloody guy, think you can do whatever you damn well please."

"Sir? ….I just moved in last night."

The person whose back he'd been staring at whirled around. Roxas had never seen anybody move like that before. Impending doom just never seemed to make much sense as a verb until that moment.

He found himself looking into the face of a person who hated him already.

It was an interesting face. Middle aged, maybe younger---the man wore his hair in a long graying ponytail. The graying could have been premature but Roxas wasn't hazarding any guesses about the eyepatch and scar, which struck a bizarre chord down the entire already awkward situation.

"Er. Hi. Roxas? I should be on ….your tenant list….why are you doing that?"

Roxas watched the man duck around his legs. Then run in small circle around him. The ritual ended when he tugged on Roxas's hair and Roxas decided that enough was enough.

"Look, old man," He snapped, slapping the man's hand away, "I don't know why you're acting crazy but it's not funny."

"Old? You wound me. And don't call me crazy, you bastard---I'm just trying to figure out how you made yourself over like this. You look like a completely different person."

"I _am _a completely different person!"

"Exactly, that's what I said! But how'd you do it? And don't think this gets you out of the rent---cause I am still pissed at you. But, I am impressed. Marly musta given you some tips. Nice acting too, it was a good touch, pretending to be a new tenant."

"I'm not _pretending _to be a new tenant! Look at all the boxes---I'm not whoever you think I am."

"Well of course you're not who I think you are. Isn't that your motto?"

"_Look, _mister. My name is Roxas. I saw an ad in the paper about this room two weeks ago, and moved in last night. I dropped a fucking box on my foot. You can see the broken plates if you want. Now be rational. Even if this guy you think I am would pull a stunt like this---would he break a whole box of china over it?"

The man looked over Roxas's shoulder. Saw the boxes. Saw the lack of furniture. His eyes met Roxas's.

"He's really gone?" He said weakly.

* * *

Ten minutes later Roxas found himself sitting across a small table from the landlord, sipping coffee. He wasn't quite sure how he'd managed to miss the fact that the apartment complex included this quaint café on the first floor, and put it down to his foul mood last night---more than one thing had caused him to drop that box, he was sure.

The dominant color was white, with splashes of crimson. The wood paneling and glass tables lent it an artistic flair that reminded Roxas of a chain café, and indeed it seemed this place was graced with the same sort of people---

You know the ones. They stand around in the aisles of your local bookstore and talk about plays they don't understand and how very nice it is that "there's some culture here, after all."

The sort of people that Roxas himself had hung out with until he couldn't take it any longer. Lately, Roxas didn't hang out with anybody.

(Much to his mum's distress. He could hear her voice like she was sitting right beside him: 'Art and poetry are very well and good, Roxas, but they're no substitute for real people.' In retrospect telling her that he strongly preferred the company of inanimate objects probably wasn't a good move, and to be honest it wasn't exactly true. Some of the time.)

"Er, yeah, kid, go ahead. Coffee's on me. It's nice, owning all the space above this little shop….did I mention I'm sorry?"

"That would be your twelfth time. How the hell does a landlord not know about it when a tenant moves out?"

"Name's Xigbar. And this wasn't your ordinary tenant. It really figures, I suppose. Guy's always moving around, always not there when you're looking and there when you're not. I feel bad for you, though. I imagine you're going to get a lot of visitors, seeing as that was where he was most of the time. Lot of people trying to find him and talk to him, just like me. But they won't all be as nice as I was."

Roxas spluttered and tried to hide it by gulping down the rest of his hazelnut coffee. (With way too much sugar, but he wasn't complaining. It was more expensive than he could afford to buy regularly.) If this guy was "nice" he didn't want to see the rest of the neighborhood.

"Um, pardon my asking, but _why?"_

Xigbar laughed. "Cause he's the coolest guy around, of course. Everybody knows his name! And that's the way he likes it. Or so the rumors go. He's more popular than breathing…"

"What _is _his name?"

"You've _gotta _be new, kid, if you don't know Axel."

"But…what makes him so cool?"

Roxas finally noticed the people at the tables around him snickering. It made him just a little bit angry, the whole situation. Coolness? Who out of highschool even used words like "cool" to describe a person?

And this…Axel character. Carrying on like…like a….Roxas, with his unlimited vocabulary, didn't even know the word to use. Words seemed to be failing their normal purposes at this point and time, so he decided to put them away for a while.

Xigbar shrugged, and Roxas stood up.

"Look….uh….thanks for the coffee, I guess. I've gotta go. Job hunting."

"Right. I'll see you later. If you make it, that is. Just remember, not everyone's as kind as me!"

"Whatever," Roxas muttered. He set down a tip for a waiter he couldn't remember seeing, and walked out of the café with his usual attitude.

Roxas walked like he meant it.

Perhaps this isn't clear.

Roxas walked like every step mattered. It takes a rare person to think this way. Others believe in merely starting points and ending points, never minding what may come between.

This idea bored him and from a young age he recognized the sad fact that most people will never think twice about even half of their steps, let alone all of them. And at some point he recognized that it was impossible for him to think about _every _single step he took.

So he decided that instead, he would simply never dawdle, and always walk like he meant it.

You are probably wondering what in god's name this has got to do with our story. And the answer is, not much, if one is thinking in terms of normal weight.

But the facts remain the same:

Roxas walked like he meant it, and for him this entailed the cursory balancing on the edge of the sidewalk, sporadically skipping, and, every once in a while, whirling around to see where his footprints were left. It was an odd sight to behold in the city, as normal as it was back in his small town where everybody knew: Roxas was aloof and uninteresting and he just happened to walk like that.

It was such an odd sight that the man pulling a cart across the road filled with flowers stopped to stare. This in turn caused the man who was watching the man pulling the cart instead turn his attention the younger man walking.

This man, the former one, not the one with the cart, watched from his new apartment window. He only saw the younger man's back, and a flash of blonde hair when he turned around for an instant---the sun was blinding so he didn't get a good look, and he didn't dwell on it too long seeing as he had boxes to unpack and places to go. All he would remember was thinking that for a fleeting moment it had looked really cool.

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**Thanks for reading! **


	3. Simply amazing

**a/n: Hullo, this is chapter three of _The cool guy. _Kingdom Hearts is copyright Disney and Square, and of these I am neither. **

**I hope you enjoy the chapter, and as always, please leave a review! **

* * *

"Hello! How may I help you?" 

Roxas almost blanched in the face of half an inch of makeup and walked right back out the book store door. But the part of him that still remembered and feared Xigbar's merciless pursuit of rent reminded him that money was a priority, a job led to money, and if this young lady led to a job, it was worth talking to her.

The convictions that some people hold are simply amazing, and it is conviction that Roxas has most of, more than anything else.

So he looked at her glossy name tag.

"Hello. I was wondering if you were hiring right now and if so could I fill out an application."

Roxas phrased the question as a statement, mostly out of the bad habits that arise from not speaking to people besides his mother on a regular basis.

The first dozen places he'd inquired at had let him know, quickly but politely, that no they were not looking for work but may they help him with something else? Not that he was particularly good with pets, children, waiting tables, or a combination of the three, but it had all been worth a try and he found himself disappointed.

But any idiot could shelve books, right?

"I'm sorry, we're not looking for help right now, can I help you with anything else?"

Apparently not, he thought.

"No. But thanks. Oh---maybe you can, actually. Do you know of anywhere that might be hiring? Like, _any_where?"

The girl blinked and leaned forward over the counter, brow furrowed in concentration.

"I think the salon needs a new stylist."

"Uh..."

"And the nail place needs another manicurist."

"...can you think of a position that doesn't require the skills of a beautician?" Roxas asked, barely keeping his tone civil.

"Well, there's plenty of other places. But some of them are shady, and others...you'll just want to avoid."

Roxas raised an eyebrow at the girl's hushed tone. "What, like postal services?"

"Much worse," she snorted.

"In what way?" Was everybody in the city deliberately vague? Roxas wondered sourly. He wasn't used to a cloak and dagger attitude---if a person had something to say, they should say it---and it rubbed him the wrong way.

"There's jobs that will throw you into the middle of places an innocent boy like you doesn't need to be."

Now Roxas rolled his eyes. This was getting ridiculous. "Places? Look, lady. I can take care of myself."

"Can you?" The girl's eyes narrowed, and Roxas sensed more than recognized the dislike in them. Coming from a stranger, the emotion was a little too intense. "You're obviously new here, so I'll ignore that attitude. Consider it your lucky day. So. You want a job...and you don't care what it is? Fine."

The change in her disposition from the beginning of their conversation was disconcerting. It was obvious----more than obvious, it was plain as day---that she put on a very different front to customers. And even though it was slipping, Roxas got the fact that she was still displaying it.

Which he personally found creepy.

He looked again at her nametag---and focused his eyes this time. Larxene.

She scribbled something with a firm hand on a pad of paper with a glitter gel pen, and the look she shot him sent a veritable shiver down his spine. _That _was no front.

By the time she handed it to him the frosty friendliness was back in her eyes.

"Just follow that address. And say Larxene sent you."

Roxas blinked. "The job is exclusive, yet you're handing it to a complete stranger?"

"Don't be dumb. The job is torture and I'm 'handing' it to you because you _piss me off. _Hopefully you'll have a few hours of pure hell before giving up---and going back to wherever the hell you came from."

* * *

Roxas read the slip of paper as he walked. He was suspecting illegal activity, certainly. Drug dealing, maybe? With her talk of innocence, prostitution was also likely---but neither of those explained why her name would have anything to do with why he got hired, or why he would give up after a few hours. 

He made sure to scan the buildings on either side of him, but he knew he was kidding himself---he'd walked up and down the main streets of the city three times already, and a fourth since leaving the bookstore. Which had been a last ditch attempt anyway.

Vaguely he realized that his legs were beginning to ache. Roxas had begun his search directly after having coffee and the sun was just starting to sink beyond the horizon: if he didn't check out the address, then he should probably head back. He didn't want to be in a city he didn't quite know yet at night. It already seemed that he stuck out as being new, too, which he knew was never a good thing. (It hadn't proved good so far, after all.)

Knowing his mum, she would ignore his request and call just as soon as he got in the apartment.

He cringed when he imagined the conversation that would undoubtedly ensue: Was he sure he didn't want to come back and run the family business? Oh. Well, in that case, Roxas, have you found a _job _yet? No? But you _must _have. After all that talk back home, about how _you _were going to get away and live your life on your _own _terms, never caring about trivial things like popularity, wealth, and society in general? Oh, well that's lovely, dear. Did you atleast meet a nice girl? No, I didn't think you had. Have a good night, dear. I love you. You're always welcome back home.

God no, hell no, Roxas was _damn_ sure he did not want to have that conversation. The worst part was that the only sarcastic speaker would be himself.

A breeze ruffled Roxas's hair as he stood on the corner of Third and Main. If anybody was watching, they would say he cut a striking figure against the soft shadows. No one was, but he struck out and made a decision anyway, turning swiftly down a side street, following the glittery numbers.

At the time he thought it a matter of desperation, but now he's not so sure, because even he will recognize this as another turning point. When strung out, the circumstances are simply amazing.

The transition between breathless seconds and breathless moments was lost to him when, after a mazelike journey through twisting alleys he normally would have been loathe to venture across, he found himself on another big street standing before a plain white building.

He looked at the address, looked at the building number. They were exact, and yet...there was absolutely nothing to distinguish this place from the rented workspaces on either side beyond the strange pink sheen on the paneling.

The door was directly in front of him and made entirely of glass----closer inspection revealed remarkable craftmanship in the form of delicately carved budding vines on the corners of the door. It was pitch black inside and there was no sign, no clue as to what it was or why it was there. It wasn't exactly the ideal place for criminal activity.

Roxas hesitated. It was probably locked. Even if it wasn't, he didn't know Larxene. What if she was just screwing with him? They'd think he was crazy and never hire him. If they were even hiring.

And what if I don't try the door, he thought, disgusted with himself. Just as his fingertips brushed against the handle he heard a creaking noise behind him and whirled around, perfectly aware that this was a city and there were dangerous people.

Possibly dangerous people who creaked.

"Well what's this then?"

Roxas blinked. He was met with the strangest thing he had seen today with the exception of Xigbar. A tall man wearing a sleek black apron over a crisp white work shirt stood behind a huge wooden cart brimming with more flowers Roxas had ever seen at once. His hair was a fairly incriminating cotton candy pink.

"Are you looking to buy an arrangement, love? I'm afraid we don't currently deliver, you understand, but you can pick up an order here any day of the week between eight and five."

Roxas was too stunned to reply. The silence stretched on until a suspicious look flicked across the man's face.

"Here now...you aren't a robber, are you?" He wagged a finger and Roxas thought he might faint from the absurdity.

"N-no, of course not." His tongue returned easily enough in the face of the accusing words.

"Oh, that's good. Huh. You don't look the type, anyway. I'll be seeing you, then." The man began to walk away, pushing the heavy cart with incredible ease.

It was now or never, Roxas thought, hating himself for the dramatics. Time to see just how much he pissed Larxene off.

"Sir? Wait a moment, please...you see, I was sent here."

The man paused, turned around to survey the person standing in front of his shop. He heard this sentence falsely claimed at least three times a week, yes, but normally people found a better time and place to say it. There was an air to the young man, in the way he stood, perhaps, that made Marluxia stop and listen to him.

"...that's what they all say, you know," He mused, plucking a flower from the cart. "At this point, I am supposed to ask who sent you. And you are supposed to either lie...or walk away."

"Right...well, her name is Larxene." The man almost dropped his flower, unnoticed by Roxas. "I'll be straight with you---I have no idea who she is. I met her today, spoke with her briefly, and she told me to come here."

If Marluxia had been surprised by the first sentence, the second utterly shocked him.

"Larxene? Lark sent you?"

"Yeah...her. But...uh...I guess I'll get going, then?" Roxas said after the man didn't say anything, and turned away---his arm was instantly captured.

"You said...you're looking for a job?"

"That was the idea," Roxas glared at the man's hand.

"Then you've got a job. Come in, come on."

Roxas found himself ushered into the building, where the flick of a lightswitch revealed an elegant space that managed to be airy and packed with floral arrangements at the same time. The walls were a pristine white, but the flowers were so colorful and so varied that the room was beautifully interesting.

The man stepped past him neatly to the back of the room where he retrieved a black clipboard while Roxas looked around.

"My name is Marluxia. And you, young fellow, are the anwer to my current problem. I have been having to drag that godawful cart around every day ever since the last errand boy threw himself out a window." He said, the last muttered darkly.

Roxas instantly stopped his inspection of the upscale store. "What did you just say?"

"I meant since he quit. Yes. I said quit. You're going to have to learn to pay more attention, Jack. Specially in this line of business."

" My name is Roxas. And what do you mean by that?"

"Right. Moving on." Marluxia spoke half to himself, filling out several important looking forms. "You can start working---" He glanced at the antique clock on the wall. Roxas noted that though it read three o' clock, he seemed satisfied---"Right now. Sign this."

Roxas looked down at the form he'd been shoved and paled.

"This is a waiver," he said. Somehow, he sensed that he should have been more disturbed than he was.

"Actually, it's not a waiver until you sign it. What's your size?"

"I'm sorry?" Roxas frowned, looking up. Marluxia was holding up two black aprons.

"These are the only two extra I have right now; of course we'll order you an exact one later.Try this on. Haven't you signed that yet?"

"Ah...no. I haven't."

"Look. Jack."

"Roxas."

"Right. I am beginning to think that perhaps my dear Larxene has had a lapse in judgement. I'm not sure you'll be able to handle this line of work."

"You don't think I'll be able to handle...running _errands._"

"I think you're under the assumption that these will be ordinary errands. And I'm telling you---the business I run is no ordinary business."

"It's...no ordinary...flowershop?"

"That's right. With every flower, there comes a message. It's a special service that only we offer. And who do you think delivers these messages?"

"The errand boy?"

"That's right. Listen, Jack, you were straight with me. So I'll be straight with you---there is one thing that makes this job the most difficult, the most sought after, and the most looked-down upon job this city has to offer. This thing is the recipient of 90 percent of our orders, and his name is--"

"Axel," Roxas said.

"Huh? Oh. I thought you were new, for some reason."

"I am. I've...heard of the guy."

"Right. So here's the deal, then." Marluxia handed him the clipboard. "If you can find Axel and deliver these messages by eight o' clock tomorrow morning, then I'll hire you. But don't think it's easy. As soon as Axel finds out there's someone after him, you've got one sadistic game of hide and seek on your hands. So far, no one's won.You've basically got no chance, Jack! But if Larxene recommended you...I'm willing to let you have a go. Got it? Make sure you're here with it done...or don't come at all."

Roxas nodded. It occurred to him as he was leaving that he didn't sign the waiver, and didn't quite trust this Marluxia.

But if it was enough to let him hang on to his convictions, enough so that he didn't make a liar of himself, then he'd do it.

* * *

Roxas returned to walking the city streets. The sky was periwinkle now, with no sun in sight, but he wasn't worried at this point. 

In his head, the logic was perfectly clear---Axel was the "coolest" guy in town. He must be the easiest to find. All he had to do was ask around, and he'd find him in no time flat. Even if he couldn't, then it would be a simple matter to outsmart him, he was sure.

And that was mistake number one.

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**Thanks for reading! If you have any comments, please leave a review!**


	4. The beginning

**a/n: Hi there! This is chapter four of The Cool Guy. I have no part in the ownership of Kingdom Hearts. All I own is this plot. Anyway, I sincerely hope you enjoy this chapter...I think it's my longest yet... **

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**Chapter Four**

Night, day.

Light, dark.

On, off.

It is sometimes said that for every action or thing in this universe, there is an opposite. To refer to the story, we may use the example:

Normal human behavior, Roxas.

This is not to say that every action Roxas will make henceforth will be adverse to every action done by man. Only that he will be spurred on to limits that he will have never thought possible, to places that he never before would have bothered to reach.

Nor am I here to preach to you about the afore mentioned principle---_however. _If it were to apply not only to actions or things, we may also say:

Roxas, Axel.

The personality of Roxas, who was currently running as fast as he could back to the more crowded streets, has already been outlined.

As for the other….

* * *

It is 9:17. The night life of the city is a booming one, an explosion of dancing, talking, gambling, and worse that lasts the whole night long before drifting away like smoke until the fire of the night is lit once more. Anybody not chained to a desk or pitifully underage is prepared to walk across its hot coals.

This fire blazes through the whole city, a ring of excitement----and danger. There are those who stand on the edges of it, letting the glow from before and after warm their daily lives, content to watch and enjoy themselves without complete abandon.

Who are they watching? Who do they crowd to whisper about, to talk with, to worship from afar?

The answer is simple if you're one of those sitting at the dance club or at the hot new restaurant. It _could_ be the person coolly watching scenarios play out with a smirk on their face.

But it's more likely to be the person watching that person. Maybe even a step further. You take another step, and you find yourself in that inner circle of people who are not walking on coals but dancing through the flames.

You only notice that their clothes are catching fire because you're not one of them. The smoke is so thick it's pitch black, but they can see perfectly, enough so that their words spark and their actions toss embers.

They are few in number and oh so popular.

Every so often one of these people, one of these dancers, is completely engulfed.

And just as often….there is one that melds with the dancing flames until _they _are the brightest thing burning around.

It is 9:17, and the man with the vivid red hair and grass green eyes---his name is Axel---is the brightest thing in the city.

* * *

"What are you, crazy?"

Roxas could only mutely shake his head. After his day, he really didn't need these rude assertions from strangers.

"I'm being serious. Do you have any idea where he might be?"

The man rolled his eyes. "Look---last time I saw him was at one of the many new year's parties he frequented."

Roxas frowned. "But it's summer."

"Exactly," he said, walking away.

Roxas sat down at one of the city's many benches.

"But…why doesn't anybody know where Axel is?" He asked out loud.

He was not expecting an answer.

And he was not expecting his landlord to leap out from the bushes beside the bench, rolling to his feet with amazing agility to slump down beside a stunned Roxas.

"Why the hell is a nobody like you wondering about a guy like him? Look, man, I've been searching for you everywhere. And you would not believe how _hectic_ it is to search for someone in this goddamned place. I almost got ran over by Marly and his fucking cart of fucking flowers…you see a creepy guy with pink hair, you stay _away_ from him, kid. Don't need you associating with him _or _his insane activities. The nerve of him! Suggesting that the whole "window" thing was partly my fault, when he was riding that kid's back all the time about it….you okay, kid? Didn't mean to scare ya…"

"Look. I don't know what's going on with everybody in this city…but could you tell me what you were doing…in the bushes?" Roxas said, all the while thinking that perhaps Xigbar could have told him that beforehand.

"Oh…" The landlord looked away, and if Roxas didn't know better, he'd swear that Xigbar was blushing. "Well, I was hiding."

"….right."

"From….uh…well, you don't need to know about that!" He said hastily.

"Okay…why were you looking for me?"

He leapt backwards when Xigbar snapped his fingers together and leaned forward.

"Right! You're late."

"I'm what?"

"Late. For the party. Well, you're not actually invited, it's sort of a...name only thing, you know? But so far as I can tell, anybody who's anybody is going to be there…and since you're new I thought I'd take you with me. So you could get a feel for the city. But! You're late."

"I---really? Thanks! This is great! He might be there, right?"

"He?"

"You know, Axel. I've got to find him. You see, I actually _did _run into Marluxia. And he hired me. Sort of. I've got to find Axel before eight. I thought I could find him just by asking around…but I must have asked thirty people and they all looked at me like I was-"

"Fucking insane!"

"Who?"

"You! I can't bloody believe this! It's only your first day….and…but why would Marly even talk to someone like you? Let _alone_…..I mean, I heard a rumor today, that there was a new errand boy….and it's _you?_"

"I…uh, well, it was Larxene, really--"

Xigbar grabbed his shoulders. "_What the fuck did you do?!"_

"Nothing!" Roxas yelped. If he hadn't been thoroughly alarmed before, he was now. "I didn't do anything. I just talked to her, and she sent me to him, and he told me to find Axel or I wouldn't get hired and….and you mentioned a window earlier, _didn't you?_ You mean he wasn't kidding about that?"

"Okay, kid, there's no need to panic, as long as you didn't sign one of his fucking contracts. Tell me you didn't." Xigbar's one eye implored him.

"I-I didn't."

The landlord released him with a relieved laugh. "Then there's nothing legally binding you to him. You don't have to do it. You had me almost pissing my pants."

"But I do have to do it."

"Come again?" The landlord looked at him sharply.

"Because I want the job."

"No. You. Don't." Xigbar stressed each word.

"Actually, I do. Trust me on this," Roxas tempted fate, using the pet name he'd overheard, "…Xiggy."

* * *

_"Okay. If we're gonna do this, we're gonna do it right. The city is a big place, kid. You call your great fucking outdoors big, well, you sit down right now and listen. There ain't no jungle compared to this shit, especially behind locked doors."_

_"We? What 'we' is this?"_

_"Shut up. You want my help?"_

_"Yes…"_

_"All right then. The population is always shifting. Think of it like an ocean. A really **big** ocean, not a sea or some shit like that. Are you following me? Okay. So think of a single person as **one** measly drop of water. A tiny thing inside this huge ocean. You could spend your whole life looking, probably, and never find it. **That's** what Axel is to you right now. Do not laugh at the example, kid. I just want you to be in the right frame of mind here."_

Roxas looked around the room of the club, where the party was. If the coffee shop had looked like chic and modern…this made it look like a kid's pretend café. It was all deep oranges and reds, with a black back drop to everything, except the floor, which was a glossy wood. The room was huge, or maybe it was just that the people made it look that way.

_"In the ocean, there's all kinds of fish. Nice small ones, not so nice big ones…"_

There were a dozen tables scattered around the dance floor, big enough to seat five or six, but small enough to make the groups look intimate and closed. As soon as he stepped into sight, he started getting stares from a couple of them.

A young man with silver hair sipping a martini tried to catch his eye.

_"Small ones will cut you up in pieces if you look away. Big ones will cut you up in pieces even if you don't."_

Roxas remembered Xigbar's words and looked away, making his way towards the gyrating center of the room---the dance floor.

_"Then there's sharks. You want, at all times, to stay away from sharks. I'd say Larxene is a good example."_

It was a simple thing to see which people were cool. There was a veritable maelstrom of people, yes---but every storm has its center.

Out of the corner of his eye, Roxas spotted Xigbar chatting with a bear of a man with long black hair. The man who reminded him so much of a pirate threw back his head and laughed at the other's words.

He had to admit, it was very strange how much Xigbar was willing to help him out here, despite the fact that as soon as they walked into the party he'd disappeared with the crowd.

_"Me? I'm…a dolphin. I'm trying to help you here, kid, but facts are facts---if a shark's got you, then I can't do anything."_

Roxas felt someone's foot hook his, so he managed to keep his balance when he would have tripped. Though the erratic low lighting didn't allow him to see the perpetrator, he heard the snide snicker.

He clutched the clipboard a little tighter, but continued to make his way across the swaying dancers around him. A few times he was almost caught up in someone's dance, barely managing to force his way out.

_"Don't look so scared, kid---what do you think you are? Sure, you're like…a tiny seahorse right now. But it's only your first day swimming, and already you've survived an encounter with Larxene and Marluxia. Some people don't."_

The music was roaring too loud now, and Roxas knew that meant he was getting closer to his goal. Xigbar told him that if Axel was there, he'd be in the middle of everything. There'd be a solid wall of people around him, and he'd have to push his way past to get Axel to notice him.

_"I don't know if you're stupid or just lucky, but…you've got this personality on ya, kid. Make sure you hold on to that. Lot of people change when they've been here a while. Course…some say it's worse to not change at all."_

And then Roxas saw what he was looking for---not four feet away there was a ring of people around a single figure. Everyone there was talking animatedly, laughing every so often at something said.

Most of them were tall, towering over Roxas by a good couple of inches. The group shifted, and Roxas caught a glimpse of some of their faces---he was amazed to note that most looked like they were models.

Clear skin, defined features that weren't too sharp, eyes that were evenly spaced. Their faces were beautifully angular, with high cheek bones and firm chins.

The dominant color seemed to be black, though some were wearing so little fabric it was amazing he noticed.

_"Probably the most important thing to remember is this---these people will not like you upon sight. And when they figure out what you're doing, most will resent you. You'll be like a painful little reminder that Axel is so popular he doesn't really care about what messages people may have for him. They won't realize that's why they're so angry at you, but it's true. Trust me, I know."_

Roxas stood watching them for just a moment, their graceful exchanges and even more graceful movements.

He tried to fight the reminders of highschool that abounded. But there were too many. This was exactly like a school dance. These were the cool kids. And he was standing, watching, hating them because of who they were and what they stood for.

He was once more on the fringe. In highschool, he'd had no reason to try and speak to any of those horrible people. Now he had to. And he had to wonder---back in highschool---what would have happened, then? If he'd tried…to approach.

"Excuse me."

_"Okay, kid---this is the door. I'm sorry I'm not good for anything but advice. Just remember what I said, and….well….you might be fine."_

No one looked at him over their shoulder.

"Um…hello?"

They kept talking, but Roxas caught on to the small smiles of those that he could see.

They were ignoring him.

He walked around to the other side of the group.

"My name's Roxas. I'm new here."

Still no reply. Roxas took a deep breath. He definitely wasn't expecting them to do this. It was immature and stupid.

"Okay. I was just wondering which one of you _jackasses _calls yourself Axel." He said tauntingly. If they were going to be childish----well. So would he.

"Heeey, guys, why don't we just tell him?"

One of the figures stepped away from the ring of people to stand before Roxas.

"_I'm _Axel. So. What do you want with me?" The young man smirked, shaking his beach blonde hair back out of his face. His blue eyes danced like the reflection of water.

Roxas was taken aback. "Oh. I, uh, I have some messages for you here. So if you could just listen--"

"Dem, don't be an idiot," a girl with pale blond hair snapped. "It's not funny. When Axel asked us to do this, I think he had a nicer procedure in mind."

"Whaaat? I'm just messing around. Besides, he said 'whatever you do, don't tell the guy anything about me.' I think refusing to talk to shortie over there was the perfect plan. No offense."

"None taken," Roxas said in reflex. Then it sank in. "No, I take it back. Are you telling me that Axel isn't even _**here?**_"

"Oops. He won't like this." The blonde looked at the girl. "Great _going_, Namine."

Roxas looked at the now grinning group. "You…this…he already knows I'm trying to find him, doesn't he."

A redheaded man in the back of the group chuckled softly.

He was wearing dark wash jeans and a faded tee under a leather jacket. His midnight colored boots scuffed against the floor as he slunk into a more comfortable position and Roxas ignored him, looking at the blonde.

"You---Dem. Are you guys his friends, then?"

"We're a few of his friends, yeah. It's Demyx, actually."

"Right. Then you can tell him---I'll be seeing him. Before eight tomorrow morning."

"_You? _What makes you think he'd let you?"

It was not Demyx, but the redhead who replied. For some reason, several people choked on silent laughter when he spoke.

Enough was enough, Roxas thought.

"What makes you think…he can stop me?" He said evenly, staring the man down. He decided that he didn't like the man's self assured tone of voice… or the arrogant way he carried himself.

"There's a couple of things. I mean, besides his name---what do you know about him?"

"Nothing. And I don't care to know more than that. I've got a job to do, and I'll get it done."

"Anyone tell you yet that---that's what they all say? I've seen a lot of people try to do what you're suggesting. They are all brilliant people. And _you… _well, honestly, I'll probably have forgotten all about you by tomorrow."

Roxas glared at him. "Maybe _you _will. Doesn't mean that Axel will."

The laughter wasn't so silent anymore.

"Hey. Maybe you'll surprise him….though at this point, I'm doubting it." The redhead casually took hold of Roxas's face, tilting it upwards.

"Right now…I'd peg you as twenty, twenty-one. You're within your first month of ever living away from your small town family. You have no job. No girlfriend. No raison d'etre….until, that is, you got this shitty gig.

And normally you wouldn't even care but now you're subconsciously centered on accomplishing it. I'm guessing you always got the best grades in school, got first in whatever competition you entered---without ever trying.

So now, when your life was already in turmoil, this challenge comes up. Somewhere along the line you tied this into your emotional state and now it's so important to you that if you fail…

….you'll snap like the neurotic twig you've become. And maybe it's because of that. But mostly it's because you're starting to realize that you're a boring person who will live a boring life and nothing interesting will ever, ever happen to you."

Roxas sucked in a deep breath that he hadn't realized he'd been delaying. Each and every word had burned.

"You...let go of me," he managed. His heart was thumping a rapid tattoo against his chest.

"You…can't judge me like that," he whispered. "You don't even know me…!"

"Hey, kid? He's already gone."

Roxas looked up at Demyx. His blue eyes, though playful and somewhat amused, held mostly sympathy.

"I'm sorry. I didn't think he'd react that way. That was….way too harsh. Even for him. Heck, especially for him. But, you gotta understand, I think something happened today, or something…he was just looking for someone to take it out on. It wasn't personal at all."

"Exactly," Roxas murmured. "He knew me…judged me…but it _wasn't_ personal. He didn't even care that he was analyzing my life! He just did it!"

Demyx watched the strange blond talk to himself, afraid that the kid was going to start crying on him. He felt bad for him. Axel had a knack for taking people apart, but that display had been ruthless. This kid—Demyx thought he had called himself Roxas-- was probably going to run home bawling and depressed, just because Axel was in a bad mood. True, everyone hated the new errand boy, but this one had been all polite and up front about it. There was something refreshing about that.

"Damn it! Damn all of it, then! _You!_"

Demyx jumped. "Yes?" What the hell?

"What was that guy's name? I'm going to deliver these messages to Axel, and then I'll give that bastard a message."

"Uh. Er." Demyx looked at Namine for help, but she just stared at him with terrified eyes, and no one else stepped forward. A couple stepped backward, watching.

Nothing like this had ever happened before. Errand boys tried and failed. Axel didn't even speak to half of them. The last had been different, yes, but this was unheard of. An attempt followed by _psychological scarring_ ought to be followed directly by giving up. Not by trying again.

"The way he said it, like he was so_...cool_…." Roxas stiffened in mute horror at his words and gasped at the dawning realization.

"He _**wasn't**_," He uttered. A quick glance around told him, that yes, he was. Another quick glance told him that Axel had already left the party.

"Look…you were really brave, not crying and all. Any of us would have, if we'd been in your position, though none of _them_ would openly admit it. Why don't you just give this up? You'll only get hurt. They all get hurt."

Roxas looked at Demyx. He didn't bother trying to keep his tone civil.

"You look yourself. If you people belittle me again….getting hurt isn't the worst thing in the universe. Okay? You guys are just like highschool…thinking that all anybody cares about is your opinion. I'm telling you lot now so I don't have to hear your shit again---I couldn't care less what Axel thinks about me. And I know he couldn't care less about what I think about him. I'm just a messenger. You think a few remarks are going to make me give up? It takes a hell of a lot more than that to dissuade me."

He was met with dead silence.

* * *

"I think I like this kid," Saix, a young man with long blue hair and a pale pointed face, said as the guy known as Roxas ran across the dance floor towards the exit, perfectly intent on catching that which could not be caught, and speaking what could not be said.

* * *

**a/n: Thank you for reading! If you have any comments, questions, or any sort of words at all to give me, then I implore you to kindly leave a review! **


	5. Day Two

**a/n: Hello, this is chapter five of The Cool Guy! I'm sorry it took me so long, but I was having extreme doubts about this chapter...**

**BE: I said it was fine. You can all thank me. HAH**

**And that was a word from my editor, Blood-eye. She helped with the whole concept of this story, and is supremely awesome. **

BE: NO I did not. It's all her brilliance!

**And now she is SPAMMING my story. **

BE: MWAHAHAHAHA

**Anyway, I certainly do not own Kingdom Hearts. Alas. Oh well, I'll get over it one of these days. Without further ado I'd like you to enjoy the chapter, and please leave a review! **

**BE: Kurama is a girl**

* * *

**Chapter Five **

"God _dammit!" _Roxas called out as, in a fit of betrayal, his foot caught on a broken beer bottle and he flew into the midnight asphalt of the street.

He broke his fall with one palm; it came away smudged with blood as he pushed himself up with a frustrated grunt, continuing his running with barely a pause. With his lungs on fire and his sides aching it was easy to ignore the stinging of his hand.

His breathing was rough, shallow---staccato, since he was currently cursing Axel, alcoholics, and his athletic ability (or lack thereof) to high hell.

He suddenly was reminded of himself as a sixteen year old boy carefully explaining to his mother that he had more important things to be doing than running track, thank you very much.

"Hah!" He gasped.

Never in his wildest dreams---and he had some strange ones---would he have guessed that it would come to this.

That it would all come down to whether or not he could chase a man down a dangerous street in the dark, his sweat plastered hair sticking to his equally damp forehead, to scanning the air with feverish eyes for a trace of that showy red hair.

Would track have really helped? He doubted it, not when the mortar holding together his self esteem had crumbled upon the contact of those acidic words, so harsh to his ears.

The confidence with which he'd abandoned the raging party was swiftly flagging.

Roxas had been running down the street for close to an hour. He had of course asked after Axel; this was the street he was pointed towards, but who knew if he hadn't gone inside one of these buildings, turned down an alley, got into a car?

It was impossible for him to know and he knew it.

Roxas kept up the chase that stifling night. He pushed himself forward until the first strokes of grey came sliding across the sky and he fell into a heap of exhaustion and frayed nerves on the edge of the sidewalk.

* * *

"Hey." 

"Nnnnng."

"No, hey you. Get up."

"_No_.Go away."

"Look, kid---you're in the way of my cart."

"Oh god!"

"What?" Marluxia watched as the obstacle drew itself up in a flurry of alarmed movement. Its straw colored hair was sticking out at the oddest angles, its ocean colored eyes fluttered in recognition, it lifted a scabbing hand to swat at the dirt covering its longish nose, all in about a second.

"I mean oh good. It's you."

"It's eight," Marluxia said, finally recognizing it to be the young man vying for the position of errand boy. He ran a hand through his abundant pink hair. "You don't look so good, Jack."

"It's Roxas."

"Well? Did you or didn't you?"

Roxas stared up at the man in shock. Here he was, crumpled on the cold sidewalk, and there was no "are you okay?" or "so why were you sleeping outside?"

In fact, Marluxia was beginning to look annoyed, so he answered, looking at his feet rather than the man.

"I found Axel at a party. No, I didn't deliver the messages. I didn't get a chance. He left and I ran after him until around dawn, when I fell asleep here."

"Right outside the shop?" Marluxia mused, and Roxas stood up in astonishment, looking around--- sure enough, the establishment was right there. He'd practically used the doorstep as a pillow.

It was a much more impressive sight in the daylight. The windows were so clear it was like they weren't even there, giving the passerby an excellent view of the splendid interior. Roxas was surprised to see a half a dozen people moving around, watering plants and arranging cards. They would have had to have stepped over him, wouldn't they?

"Come on, then," the pink haired florist grabbed his arm for the second time in as many days and dragged him through the glass door. Somewhere in the front room's depths a cheerful bell rang and everyone in the store looked up.

"Sleeping beauty finally wakes up?"

"I guess he wasn't dead at all. You win," one man said, and flipped a coin at another.

"And here I thought he'd never walk through the door."

"Errand boys are a dime a dozen, anyway."

"Yeah---if a dime's worth a diamond."

"Oh, shut up, all of you," Marluxia snapped. "Look at him, you're going to scare him away!"

Roxas stared at the sight before him. He'd never seen a pair of individuals quite so…_individual _before. Marly's hair was not the strangest thing by far.

One of the men had long black dreadlocks, hanging down from an elegant knot fashioned at the back of his head. He was the one that lost the bet: he spoke with a smooth english accent in a measured, deep voice, and his eyes were like two blue chips of ice, predatory in nature as he scoped out Roxas.

As soon as his gaze connected Roxas recognized him as the large man Xigbar had been laughing with at the party. He seemed much less wild in these surroundings, calmer by nature.

Standing some feet away from him, fiddling with a rack of sympathy cards, was the man he'd flipped the coin to. His coloring was not unlike Roxas's own, but his eyes were smaller, sharper. He had a beard that accented a firm chin and a single hoop dangled from one ear, glinting in the sun. His smile was cool and clever. On the whole, he reminded Roxas of a fox.

They were the only two wearing aprons---so far as he could tell, the other people in the shop were customers.

Roxas wondered at the severity of their language in front of their own patrons; it was downright eerie. No one seemed offended or even surprised, a few smiled greetings at Marluxia and one even waved at Roxas before turning back to inspect the arrangements.

"Follow me," Marluxia said, and he opened a door Roxas hadn't noticed before, partially concealed by a graceful bower.

It led to another sprawling room filled with stacks of paper and miracle-gro. There were a couple of desks scattered with office supplies and in the back of the room was a table with a coffee machine on it and a large tower of paper cups.

"I don't get it," Roxas said as Marluxia went digging through a box of markers. After looking at Roxas intensely for a moment, during which the subject took a wary step backwards only to find someone had shut the door behind him, he selected a yellow one.

Roxas was mesmerized as he strode over to the large writing board on the wall and added the name Jack to a colorful list of what he assumed were employees and employee tasks. Marluxia's own name was up there in hot pink, he noted. Under it was written in a flowing script:

-drag around god damned cart.

-search for errand boy.

-process new orders.

-run store, etc.

Marluxia watched him read it.

"There's nothing not to get. You're hired." He underlined Jack pointedly.

"But…I didn't do what you said. And you said if I didn't deliver the messages, then I shouldn't come at all--"

"—but you did." Marluxia cut him off. "That means you are persistent--"

"But--"

"Which is just the quality I am looking for--"

"But--"

"And since you actually found him, you are also smart, which I am also looking for--"

"_But--"_

"And if you interrupt me one more time then I will change my mind."

Roxas stemmed his protest in the face of this threat, taking the apron Marluxia held out to him and pulling it over his head. It fit perfectly, which did not escape his boss's notice.

"Hmm. I thought you two would be the same size. Lucky thing he wasn't wearing it that day, otherwise….well, you wouldn't want to wear it."

It didn't take a genuis to figure out that he was talking about the previous errand boy who had apparently thrown himself out a window. Roxas shivered when he thought about it, suddenly seized by the desire to rip the garment off.

He didn't.

"Okay. There are a few things I need to say. First off, I don't normally hire people like you. This job takes a certain aura and I don't think you have it." Marluxia sniffed, looking at him with lazily haughty eyes.

"The second is that no one has held on to this job for more than four days. The record goes to Larxene and she fought tooth and claw and still couldn't find Axel more than three days in a row. Got it?"

Roxas nodded. Somehow, he wasn't surprised to hear that.

"Okay. Thirdly, you answer to me and only me. Don't be tricked by malicious people pretending to be able to order you around. Xaldin and Luxord will try to mess with you; don't take it personally. Fourthly, tie your apron!" The last was barked out and Roxas jumped to reach behind himself for the black ties.

"So---let me get this straight. When you say no one's held on to it for more than four days--"

"I mean if you go more than one day without finding Axel, you're sacked. Company policy."

"So, if I don't find him today…?"

"Right; then it's tomorrow you have to worry about. And I think that's just about all the wisdom I have for you today. ….hold on, then." Marluxia frowned. "Where did the clipboard go?"

Roxas looked down at his hands, as if that would make the clipboard magically reappear.

"I---I don't know," he admitted.

* * *

"_Dearest Axel, you are my one tru luv. I didn't mean to smack you like that, plz come back."_

"Yeah. Riiight."

"_This is for me and my parrot, you jerk! I hope you __**rot! **__No! I hope you rot in __**hell!**__"_

Axel thought back to the shriveled black roses he'd gotten a couple weeks ago with mild interest. Strangely enough he could remember the parrot but not the owner.

"_Hi. You don't know me, but I know you…"_

"There are less creepy ways to announce admiration, but that's pretty bold."

"_It's your birthday, right? I know you'll never get the message, but these are from Demyx!"_

"Huh." His birthday had been months ago.

Axel stopped reading from the clipboard to take a sip of coffee, smiling to himself. His smile was interrupted by the sound of a phone ringing.

"Roxas, honey! Please answer the phone. This is your mother. You know, the woman who _gave birth to you. _Surely you remember…I guess you're out. I just wanted to tell you that I love you, and I've got your room just as you left it in case you want to come back and run the family business. Are you eating well? Coffee is not food, dear." The woman's voice paused on the answering machine.

"I'd like to think that you're out chasing a pretty girl. Bye for now."

* * *

Roxas was in a foul mood when he left the flower shop behind. Marluxia had yelled at him for being careless before decreeing that he only had one day to find Axel now and practically threw him out the door after writing: 

-retreive clipboard

Under Jack's list of tasks.

It was half past eight and Roxas decided that he should first touch base and go to his apartment before trying to scour the city again.

Through the sheer luck of being able to remember street names Roxas found himself walking through the door of the coffee shop twenty minutes later, outwardly worse for wear but inwardly refreshed and relaxed.

He was cautious in stepping through the door, half expecting to be assaulted by the landlord.

Xigbar was nowhere to be found, apparently deciding to leave Roxas to his own devices.

Roxas didn't think to actually enter his apartment.

Instead he lounged at the coffee shop, taking his time in devouring a blueberry muffin, watching the people watching him with a half scowl on his face.

One of the many facts of life is that people can live out their existences not thirty feet away from people who would change their lives, if they would only notice them and break through society to say hello.

It was currently a fact of Roxas's life that Axel was those metaphorical thirty feet away, was in fact sitting in Roxas's apartment without the slightest idea who lived there now, and had _already _changed his life.

Noticing Axel, now, that was no problem. The challenge lay within the reversal.

Roxas began thinking of his life and whether he'd had any experiences from which to draw advice. This was a dilemma with no clear solution in sight.

But Roxas is persistent by nature, and he knew that he was. And soon enough, thinking of persistence brought to mind a far off summer from his far off small town.

The memory involved a paper route, a bicycle, and a stubborn man by the name of Mr. Gall.

Mr.Gall was ungenerous in paying his dues for the paper, and took no small pains to avoid whatever unfortunate paper boy that had him on his route.

He was also a sadist, Roxas remembered, taking an especially large bite of his muffin. After five paperboys had abandoned the task in despair, and after his mother had been pestering him for about a week to obtain a job, he took the paper route.

Sure enough, on collection day, the man let himself out of his house at the approach of the bike, which could be easily heard.

He had deduced that the man had no hidden power of observation, that it was only the sound of the bike which alerted him to the paper boy's presence, giving him the opportunity to vanish.

Roxas smiled. The next day he didn't use the bike.

It was a simple solution, and yet it had proved too much for five others of his same age.

And it came to him, just as he was finishing the muffin, that perhaps this wasn't so different, wasn't so impossible, that sometimes the most difficult things have the simplest answers.

To catch Axel, all he had to do was not use the bike.

* * *

**a/n: Thanks for reading! **


	6. A change

**a/n: Hullo and welcome to chapter six of The Cool Guy. I don't own Kingdom Hearts. Sad but true. **

**So. I wrote all of this in one day. Please leave me a review telling me what you think...this chapter will seem confusing, I'm sure. But it's all part of my evil plan...wait, not evil. Master. Yeah. Anyway, I hope you enjoy reading!**

* * *

**Chapter Six**

Roxas sighed before walking inside the bookstore. He didn't want to get within ten miles of Larxene, especially after Xigbar's reaction to his having met her. But he had to know several things about Axel if he was ever going to find him, and Marluxia _had_ said that she was the best messenger he'd had.

So he walked up to the counter. He saw her at the far end, bending over a stack of books, flipping through them. Her jeans cinched tightly around a slim waist and her form fitting t shirt was riding up. Roxas lifted a brow when he looked over his shoulder and saw a group of teenage boys who were pretending to read watching her with mixed expressions of fear and awe.

He cleared his throat and she lifted a finger.

"Hang on just a moment, please." She set down the book and looked at him.

"Not _you," _She groaned.

"Hi, um, I guess that means you remember me. Heh….Larxene, I was wondering if I could---"

"There is no way in hell I am dating _your_ skinny ass, you geek."

Roxas mentally shrank back in terror. "I---ew---no. I wouldn't date my skinny ass either, actually…."

Larxene frowned. The hell was he babbling about? And, for that matter, what was he even doing here?

"Look. The reason I came here was to ask you some questions--"

"I don't think so--"

"---about Axel."

"Hell no." She said coldly, staring down her nose at him.

"But I need your help!"

"Why do you need _my_ help? Everyone knows about Axel, go ask someone who can stand your presence."

"But---it needs to be you. You're the best at finding him, you're the one who did it longest, you're the one who told me to follow that address!"

"It's not my fucking problem."

Roxas really never was one for not speaking his mind. The phrase she was using was one he knew well, one he used all the time. Half of the comments his mother made could be answered with "it's not my problem," and that is exactly how he answered them.

"That's bullshit. Look, lady---you have no idea what I've been through since yesterday. You told me to take the job and I took it. The only reason I got it was because of your name. Now, I was surprised at what the job actually was, but I figured I could do it---so I waded through masses of people until my landlord jumped out of the bushes to drag me to a party, where I was stared at, tripped, and then ignored by the people I needed to talk to. Then I _wasn't _ignored, and now, after I found him and lost him, after I spent the whole night sleeping in the street, if Jack doesn't find the clipboard I'll be fucking fired! Please, for the love of god---no! For the love of _sanity, _please just answer my questions!"

Larxene fixed him with a piercing glare. Roxas paled, remembering Xigbar's words.

_You want, at all times, to stay away from sharks. I'd say Larxene is a good example._

"You sound pretty miserable," she said.

"What? I mean, well, yeah."

"It'd be a lot easier for you to give up….if you gave up, you wouldn't be this miserable…."

"Well, yes, but--"

"Okay. Ask me whatever you need to know. I promise I won't lie."

The psychology of this was not lost on Roxas. "You…you're going to help me because you want me to miserable."

She half smiled in answer. It was perhaps the scariest smile he'd ever seen.

"Whatever. Okay, here's my first question. Is Axel left handed?"

"What the hell kind of question is that? You expect to find him from knowing what hand he writes with?"

"Not exactly." He glanced to the left, deep in thought.

"Are you screwing with me?" Her tone was deadly.

"No, I swear I'm not," Roxas said quickly, hands gripping the counter.

"Okay," she said warily. "He's left handed. I don't see why it matters, but he's left handed."

"Thanks. Does he have a license?"

"Hah! As if anyone would ever let someone like him drive a car….he does, but it's suspended right now."

"Does he drink alcohol?"

"Sometimes."

"Can he dance?"

"Sometimes."

"Would you say he likes to take walks outside?"

"….maybe? How am I supposed to know?"

"Sorry. Did he graduate from high school?"

"With honors."

"How long have you known each other?"

Larxene tilted her head. The boy in front of her was terse, intent. And he wasn't even writing any of this down.

"Since elementary school."

"What's his favorite time of day?"

"…."

"Okay, sorry. What was his favorite subject?"

"I don't think he had one. Art, maybe?"

"Does he like art?"

"Are you stupid?"

"Answer the question, please."

"Yes, he likes art, that's what I just said," she snapped. She was getting irritated. An erratic line of questioning like this had nothing to do with anything.

"What kind of art?"

"Performance."

Roxas stared at her, eyes unblinking. "Performance art," he repeated.

"Yeah." She said shortly.

"Right. And….about how often would you say he comes to this store?"

Larxene shrugged. "I don't know. Once a month, maybe twice."

"Who's his best friend?" Roxas asked suddenly, remembering his biggest question.

"Well…" She leaned forward, slumping across the counter. Roxas heard the boys whisper excitedly and he made sure to keep his eyes on her face. He would never have looked down her shirt, but god knew what she'd do if she thought he was trying.

Probably stab him with the gel pen she'd been twirling between her fingers, from the way he caught her look down at it before looking sharply at the teenagers.

"Mostly it's Demyx. But that's a little one sided. The one I would call his best friend….isn't around right now. And they weren't really best friends anyway, they just got along pretty well." Larxene looked at Roxas. There was the standard dislike, but it was burning a little duller now.

"Hey. Kid like you hasn't got any plans for tonight, I'm sure. I don't know why but I like talking to you. Don't get me wrong---I hate your guts. I probably only like you cause you're so pathetic."

Roxas raised his eyebrows. "Pathetic? I guess….that's what I am. Look, I'd like to thank you, but I actually do have plans for tonight."

"What? There's no way in hell you have a girlfriend."

"Why does everyone just assume that?" Roxas bit out. "You're right, though, I don't. But what you've said has made me realize I have an appointment."

"What, like a dentist appointment?"

"No. A beauty salon."

"Why the hell are you going to a beauty salon?"

"Because I can't _use _the bike."

Larxene stared after him as he waved a quick goodbye and walked out of the bookstore. She shook her head, brandished the pen at the teenagers, and got back to work. Insanity, after all, was contagious around here.

* * *

Xigbar walked out of the shower with a smile on his face.

The steam had done wonders for his hangover, his eyepatch was not itchy, and he could have sworn that while he'd been chatting with Xal last night Demyx had looked his way.

Maybe.

Well, two out of three was fucking good, anyway, in his book.

Despite his high mood, he couldn't shake the feeling that he was forgetting about something.

Or someone.

* * *

_KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK. KNO----_

Axel looked up from the couch. The door was vibrating; an occurrence that meant only one thing.

"What do you want, Xig?" He called lazily.

* * *

Xigbar halted his frenzied pounding on Roxas's door.

"Axel? Christ, man, you fucking _went home _with him? I didn't know you were gay, kid."

"Kid? Who do you think you're yelling at, man?"

Axel made his way to the door and opened it, staring at the landlord. His long hair was hanging free, dripping water onto the carpet, and he was shirtless. There was relief in his eyes.

"I don't want to talk to your punk ass, Axel. I was just checking to make sure the kid was okay. But I guess things really went his way, huh?" Xigbar laughed.

"…I'm alone in here, you know."

His laughter died. "What? Where's Roxas?"

"Who's Roxas?"

"What did you fucking do to him?!" Xigbar started forward with hell in his dark eyes.

Axel was thinner but he caught hold of the other man easily.

"Calm down, you're babbling….oh. You're drunk, aren't you?"

"No, I'm not drunk, I'm mad!"

"Mad, insane, crazy----_drunk."_

"You're not supposed to be here! You moved out!"

"Well, yeah. But I was in the neighborhood last night and didn't feel like walking to my new place, and it's not like anybody had moved in yet."

Xigbar stared at the red haired man as if he was an apparition.

"Are you fucking trying to tell me you really truly to all fucking heaven did not realize that there's a new tenant?"

"A new tenant? It's just the way I left it."

Both men paused as the phone rang. The answering machine came on and a woman began speaking.

"Roxas, please answer your phone, honey. How am I supposed to know if you're doing okay in that new apartment if you don't talk to me? Well, okay, I know I'm not supposed to call for a week. But how am I supposed to know if you're not passed out on the kitchen floor? Or trapped in an elevator? Or _dead?! _Well? No answer for that, I suppose. Hayner called the other day to inquire about your health, and all I could say was that I didn't know. I love you, dear. Please, please, please do your laundry. And eat."

A pair of light green eyes slid over to a much darker pair.

"That's the third time this morning. She keeps getting the wrong number."

"Axel?"

"Yep."

"_**You**__ don't __**have **__a phone_."

"You know, I was wondering where those curtains came from too."

* * *

"Are you sure about this?" The strawberry haired stylist, a girl around his age, looked down at him in concern.

"Dead."

"What?" She gasped.

"Dead sure," Roxas said hastily.

"But…"

"Like I said: do whatever you want, but make me look as edgy as you possibly can. As far from boring as there is."

* * *

**a/n: right...so for those of you who don't understand what's going on...enlightenment and more will come in the form of chapter seven? Let's go with that. Roxas is the one with all the plans...**


	7. Sora

**a/n: Oh my god! Chapter seven _does _exist! But seriously---I am sorry it took this long for me to write this. Please forgive me! In payment, this is my longest chapter yet. **

**Kingdom Hearts is the property of Square and Disney. No amount of wishing can change that... without further ado, here's the chapter! I hope you enjoy reading.**

* * *

**Chapter Seven**

Roxas had once spoken with a wise man.

The wise man had imparted three pieces of advice.

One---never sit with your back to the exit, no matter where you are.

Two---somebody who needs to _ask _you if you're "okay" is not your friend.

Three---Never, ever, become someone you're not. Because all you'll really be doing is kidding yourself, even if the whole bright world around you is deceived.

Well, okay. The school delinquent wasn't exactly a wise man, and he hadn't exactly been talking to Roxas.

Still, sometimes things become habit. Roxas always sat facing the door. He didn't really have any friends.

And number three?

Well. Roxas never really was one for habits, anyway.

You might be asking yourself, what exactly has Roxas done? And what exactly is he thinking?

What he has done is easily enough explained---it involves semi permanent hair dye, a pair of color contacts, and two shopping bags full of what the sales lady assured him were very chic clothes.

It also involves spending the last of his money and adopting a whole new persona.

As for what he is thinking, well. What he is thinking is that he is a mere two steps away from imminent victory over the cool guy.

I probably don't even have to tell you that this is mistake number two.

* * *

"I'm warning you, Axel---if that kid _is _trapped in an elevator somewhere, I'm calling that woman and telling her it was _your _fault." Xigbar admonished, brandishing an accusing finger. 

Axel rolled his eyes as he sauntered out of the apartment building, accidentally leaving the clipboard on the couch.

"Whatever. Listen, tell me if you see Marluxia around. I need to speak with that bastard."

"Why's that?"

"You, of all people, should know why," Axel said over his shoulder, stopping completely.

"Hey. He'll be getting out soon. You can see him then."

"Yeah. I know."

And then he was gone. Xigbar shook his head slightly and winced---the healing effects of the steam had worn off. He weighed the advantages of looking for Roxas against the advantages of relaxing with a newspaper and eating breakfast. Or lunch. More like a late lunch, really.

"He's a tough kid. He handled Larxene, he can handle an elevator."

And besides, it wasn't like he was going to deliberately seek out the company of those people who could do him considerable harm.

* * *

The first thing to do, Roxas decided as he stood awkwardly in the dark wash jeans, distressed t shirt, and trendy charcoal jacket, was to go and find one of those people who'd been around Axel before and see if he had done a good enough job of transforming himself. 

Fate works in mysterious ways, and since he is the protagonist here, it works doubly so for Roxas:

No sooner had he turned around that he collided with a tall blue haired blur. He stumbled once and quickly caught hold of the young man's wrist, teetering out of balance.

"I'm quite sorry," Roxas said, stifling his natural impulse to speak choppily and quickly, reaching for the slightly refined voice he had used to recite literature in class.

"No, no, no---don't be sorry. I was running, it's my fault." He---and despite his slender frame and silky long hair, it was a he---panted, slumping forward with his pale hands on the knees of his tapered corduroy pants.

When he looked up, Roxas was met with an alluring angular face, deep set golden eyes, and a bold scar composed of two slashes on the man's otherwise smooth forehead, forming an X.

"Not at all. Are you all right?"

He immediately recognized him to be one of that arrogant group from the party the night before. He'd stood to the far left, Roxas remembered, and had watched the scene unfold with barely a change of expression. Had he joined in the laughter, in the snide smiles? That he couldn't recall.

"Fine, thank you. And you? I hope I didn't hit you too hard….by the way, I don't think I've ever seen you before. What's your name?" He cocked his head to one side, reminding Roxas of an inquisitive tropical bird---bright and curious and strange.

Name? Name? Roxas searched his mind frantically. Despite his careful planning, the issue of a name hadn't occurred to him. But of course he couldn't use his real name, the chances were too high that someone had actually paid attention to him. He looked around. His eye caught on the mirrored store front next to them, in which the street signs were reflected backwards, and upon the X shaped scar of the stranger.

"My name is…Sora," He said as coolly as he could manage. Is that really the best I can come up with? He thought. It wouldn't take two seconds for someone to realize that it was an anagram for his real name. But there was no helping it now, and indeed the man barely blinked at the sound of it.

"That's an interesting name," He commented.

If, at any point and time in Roxas's relatively short life, he should have paid closer attention to the subtleties in a person's voice, it would have been then. It would have saved him a great deal of grief and trouble, and just maybe, it might have solved all of his problems.

Unfortunately for his soon to be future self, it was not meant to be.

"Ah! But I'm being rude. My name is Saix. Saix Mer." Saix leaned closer, offering his hand.

When Roxas took it in his own to shake the man leaned in further, his eyes brushing Roxas's.

Roxas flinched at the unexpected proximity---his hand was unexpectedly chilly. Immediately Saix pulled back, releasing his hold.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you. I was just thinking that your eyes are the most peculiar shade of blue."

As well they should be, Roxas thought. He had bought the vivid blue contacts to go over his own robin's egg gaze in order to come up with a striking color---one that wasn't easily forgotten, so that people wouldn't guess they had seen him before.

"People say that every so often."

"So, then. You're new. When did you get here?"

"I arrived last night. Traffic was horrible." Roxas found that lying through his teeth got considerably easier as he went on.

"I see. A lot of people are attracted to the possibilities of a city like this." Saix's tone was almost bitter when he swept his hand in a gesture meant to take in everything around them.

"Of course."

"And so, why are you here then?"

"I guess you could say I'm here to become someone else." Roxas answered carefully, satisfied to hear the ring of truth in his words.

A tainted, warped truth, the reality of which was sending his mental state to hell---but truth nonetheless.

Saix stood stock still. Then he doubled over, unable to suppress the laughter fighting to escape. A combination of surprise and curiousity overcame him every time he tried to stop.

Roxas stared in consternation at the spectacle, lamely waving at passersby to just keep going.

"I'm sorry---I'm not laughing at you. Well. Maybe I am."

And then he was incapable of speech, while Roxas stood and tried to fight against the flush creeping across his neck.

"I shouldn't have asked so personal a question," he said, calmer. "But I didn't think that you would answer. And with such an interesting answer! So novel, so…different, from any other response I could have hoped to get. Say---I was chasing someone down just now---a rogue novelist---you see, I'm an editor, but that's not important---would you like to go grab some coffee?"

* * *

"Are you really sure this is okay? What about your novelist?" Roxas asked later, stirring some cream into his coffee.

The café was a small, out of the way place, with classic furniture and décor---its detached warmth was such welcome contrast from the chain café on his first floor that after seeing the inside he willingly followed Saix over to a table in a secluded but inviting corner.

There was something distinctly fluid about the way the man moved. He stepped lightly, but not without purpose---something Roxas approved of greatly. His motions were graceful and delicate, making him think somewhat of Marluxia.

Marluxia.

The thought of his employer's name alone was enough to remind him that this was not a joyride. Becoming Sora was a means to an end, and atleast part of that end had to arrive before the day was out or Roxas would be completely and thoroughly screwed over for life.

"Well…let's just say, circumstances being as they are, he can't have strayed far." Saix smiled, sharp canines prominent.

Roxas turned his splutter into what he hoped was a polite cough. "I see," he managed (at the same time wondering what, exactly, he was getting himself into).

"Do you?" Amusement in the form of a lifted brow. For the large part Saix's face remained expressionless, but for the smallest of frowns. It was a frown that seemed almost perpetual and the longer Roxas looked at it the sadder it appeared. (It was at great odds with his lively, teasing eyes, eyes that warned him of arrogance but spoke of kindness.)

"Ah—no, I suppose I really don't."

"Truth is the first step to enlightenment."

Roxas barely kept himself from flinching. Was it possible…that Saix was, to use the cliché, on to him? "You think so?" He uttered. He covered himself by taking a slow sip of his coffee.

(If he was not in so much apprehension, Roxas might have done well to notice that the _only _thing he'd had to eat since that blueberry muffin was coffee. Hundreds of miles away his mother was no doubt also flinching.)

"Oh, yes. It's quite applicable as well."

"Applicable?" If it would not be putting himself in obvious jeopardy, Roxas would have squeaked.

"Of course. What good is a belief if one cannot put it into use?"

Hearing these words, Roxas looked at his dark reflection in the cup he held firmly between his hands. It was an unfamiliar reflection. Would, he wondered suddenly, his mother recognize him looking like this? His gaze shifted to the swirling (in the coffee) background.

Behind him was the wall---his choice of seating gave him a clear, open view of the exit.

"Are you suggesting," Roxas started mildly, "that a person cannot have hold of a philosophy without putting it to use?"

"I am not suggesting it, Sora."

For reasons Roxas couldn't fathom, a half sigh escaped his lips.

"I am declaring it."

Roxas's hand twitched, and the coffee mug slipped from his grip to spin crazily on its side.

For perhaps half a second it remained balanced on its rim. Only half a second, mind.

And then it hit the glass surface of the table with an alarming shatter that mingled with Roxas's quick grunt of pain as one of the shards from the mug found its way into his right hand, slicing the pale skin and dredging up a thin line of blood.

Saix immediately stood up and began mopping up the mess. He gingerly picked up the pieces, folding them up into a napkin.

"Waiter!" He called before asking Roxas intently, "Are you okay?"

The words stuck in Roxas's head as he calmly wiped the blood off. The cut was a shallow one---that kind that looks ugly but really wasn't---the shard had sliced his hand from one side around to the palm in a smooth curve.

"I'm fine, it's not deep at all."

"Good. We had a small mishap," he explained to the waiter, who was staring at Roxas's hand.

"Still, I'm sorry. Again. We've just met and I've only had cause to apologize."

"Not at all; both times it was my own clumsiness." Roxas matched him evenly stride for stride. He was starting---for some reason---to get the feeling that this man, like Larxene, was wearing a polite façade.

Or maybe it's just that I'm the one behind a façade, he thought. But that was the idea. It was his plan, god dammit, the only one he could come up with on such short notice. He was tired of playing by the rules and so he would cast them aside, starting with the identity that had thus far got him nowhere.

"If you say so…well, I'm sorry to be so abrupt after sweeping you away like this, Sora. I'm sure you were in the middle of something."

The man's tone was smooth enough to be considered oily, now.

"Oh, nothing much, just what I've been doing since I got here." Searching this city top from bottom. I'd like to see you give it a try, Mr.Mer.

"But haven't you just arrived?"

_Shit. _"Of course. I meant…becoming someone else."

There was that predatory smile again, and a flash of something almost tribal in his golden eyes.

"I see. Becoming someone else. We never discussed exactly why you'd want to do that…Sora."

Roxas searched the man's eyes. He was suddenly compelled to try a trick his best friend---a cheerful, rowdy guy named Hayner---had schooled him to use. A person is never as likely to maintain eye contact for more than a few seconds with a stranger as opposed to someone they know, even if they only met once.

"That's not a trick," Roxas remembered arguing, shoving his friend. (What _was _Hayner doing now, he wondered.)

"You say that now. But sometimes it's little things like that that end up being useful."

And so Roxas started counting.

One.

Two.

Th—

Saix looked down and out the window.

That was enough information for Roxas. Coupled with his manner of speech and other telltale signs, despite his altogether creepy remarks, he was truly seeing a stranger named Sora and not a messenger boy named Roxas.

"A person has many reasons for the things they do," Roxas said, getting up to leave. "In this case I only have one, but it's a pretty good reason. I think I've already succeeded. Until we meet again, then," he said, moving toward the exit which he'd kept within his sights.

And though he knew it might blow his cover, for those thirty seconds Roxas walked like he meant it.

"Bloody amazing," Saix said to himself, watching the trendy figure take his unique leave. "Sora. Self assured, intelligent, philosophical and polite---a rapier wit that never quite showed itself, and an astounding display of individuality. I've got to introduce this guy to Axel."

He even had the perfect opportunity to do so.

* * *

"But…you promised! Namine is going to kill me if you don't show up at her art show, Axel. Please. I'm begging you. I'm your flesh and blood, for pity's sake! And I already told her you would. And so if you don't show, she's going to really kill me this time. I'm too young to die, Axel!"

Axel lifted an eyebrow at the antics of the younger man lounging beside him. He paused his unpacking, setting down a stack of fantasy novels.

"Too naïve to die, maybe. Dem, she's got you on a leash. And you're not even _straight. _If Namine told you to go jump off a bridge, would you do it?"

"Axel. This is _Namine _we're talking about."

"...actually, you've got a point. For anyone else…"

"Namine would have a good reason."

"Staying on the bridge would probably be worse, anyway."

"Staying on the bridge would probably be certain death, Axel." Demyx sighed. "She really adores you, you know? Her eyes light up whenever someone says your name. Of course, most people's eyes do that, but for her it's…like magic."

"She's a good girl," Axel acquiesced.

"Yeah. So touch her and you're dead, you hear?" Demyx muttered.

"Loud and clear. Kairi would probably butcher me before I got within ten feet of her, though, even if I was interested."

"Damn straight… wait, so are you saying you'll go?"

"Of course I'm going, Dem, it's Namine's first art show. I'd be a cold bastard not to go."

* * *

Roxas hadn't made it three feet down his hallway when a dark shape grabbed hold of him, swinging him up in the air.

"Roxas! You're _alive! _You're okay! You're--" The spark of joy in his landlord's eyes spluttered and snuffed out when he swung Roxas back around, and they faced each other nose to nose. "---you're not Roxas," he said, and released him.

"Damnit, Xiggy!" Roxas yelped, rubbing his tailbone. It was the same unforgiving floor that had broken his china two nights ago. "Of course it's me."

"I don't know who you are and what you fucking want, man, but nobody calls me Xiggy without my permission. If you've got something to say, say it, or get lost."

The younger man couldn't believe his eyes. He took out his room key, and shoved it under Xigbar's nose.

"See? It's me."

"You...you…"

"Yeah, that's---"

"----you fucking mugged my tenant?!"

"No! I AM your fucking tenant!" Roxas roared. What the hell was _wrong _with this man?

Digging in his pocket, he took out the contact case and quickly removed his lenses. He dragged a cursing Xiggy to the bathroom that everyone on the floor shared and bent his head under the sink, scrubbing with his hand furiously for a moment, and finally took off his jacket.

He spun around, hands on hips.

"Do you see now?" He demanded.

* * *

"You lost me, Roxy."

"Okay. It came to me when I was eating breakfast downstairs---"

"You were…here? This morning? Like, here?"

"Yes…" Roxas said slowly. "Why? I didn't have time to come up. See, I kind of spent the night in the street."

"You _what?"_

"Just what I said. I was running after Axel, but I couldn't catch him, so…" he shrugged. "I think I must have passed out. Marluxia woke me up since it turned out I'd fallen down right outside the flower shop. Go figure, huh?"

"Tell me again."

So Roxas recounted the night before, his experience with Marluxia and company, his revelation, and the beginnings of his plan to ensnare Axel.

"You've got some kind of luck, kid. Axel was _here. _He spent the night in your room, listening to your sweet old mum rant on the answering machine."

"He was _what?!" _

"The nerve of him, right? I told you---always there when you're not looking, and nowhere to be found when you are. He's like that. By the way, he had a clipboard with him, and seemed smug about it."

The blood drained from Roxas's face. So he hadn't lost the damned thing after all. Axel had taken it from him. But when? Surely…not when he was unconscious?

"That cold _bastard," _Roxas swore.

"Don't worry, he left it on your couch….kid. Look at me for a second. You sound awfully worked up. Are you sure you want to continue this? I mean, if you're that hard up, I know plenty of people who'd hire a determined kid like you, a kid with your kind of conviction."

"I appreciate the sentiment, Xig. But…I _need _to do this. You don't understand, if I don't do this then it means I'm _without _conviction. It means I'm _without _determination. It means I'm not everything I said I'd be. I can't make a liar out of myself."

"And pretending to be someone else isn't lying?"

"I…"

"I'm not criticising you, Roxy. I'm just saying, it doesn't sound like you."

Roxas laughed shortly. "That's the point, isn't it? Don't worry. I can pull this off, I'm sure of it. From here on out everything will get simpler."

"I suppose…Roxas?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you hear sobbing coming from your room?"

They ran back down the hallway and flung open the door to Roxas's apartment in time to hear a voice that sounded like it was teetering on the brink of something not-so-nice.

"Roxas, this is your mother. Again. My dear son, I can only come to the conclusion that either you have been kidnapped, or you are dead. And if you're not the former then you'd better hope you're the latter, because bad things happen to young men who don't humor their mothers. Do you understand me, Roxas? I hope you do. The weather here is cloudy. Like my _soul. _Love, your mother."

"Are…you sure you didn't want to get that?"

The two stood looking at the phone. It was green. Sort of old. And yes, distinctly _menacing. _

"N-nah," Roxas said, slightly shaken. "I think I'll take my chances with Axel."

"Sounds wise."

"Yeah."

"Your mom kind of reminds me of this girl I know…shit!"

"Huh?"

"Comon, kid, fix yerself up---I almost forgot, I've gotta be somewhere tonight. A friend's having an art show."

"An art show?" Something like hope leapt in Roxas's chest.

"Yeah, sounds lame, but she'll kick my ass if I don't show."

"Not at all. He loves art."

"What was that?"

"Nothing," Roxas smiled. It was a smile graced with the confidence that the pieces were finally starting to come together.

* * *

The girl standing in the middle of the soft white room was petite, with sky colored eyes and pale yellow hair that draped over her delicate shoulders like a graceful shroud. She was clad in a simple but stylish white dress, with cute white flats.

A small smile formed on her faintly rosy lips as she surveyed the exhibit. It was literally Namine Blanc's life work. Her art was colorfully reminiscent of a happy childhood and at the same time displayed an ominous knowledge of the unforgiving world. To say that her art was her life would be putting things lightly.

She had to refrain from looking up at the artistic clock every few minutes, pausing in her excited pacing to smooth the ruffles in her dress for the twelfth time.

The first visitors would be arriving through the doorway soon, and she wanted to look perfect.

Because everything around her was perfect. As it should be. In its proper place.

It was her night to shine. Nothing, she felt, could ruin this.

It just so happened that on Namine Blanc's night to shine, a young man named Riku decided to take his dog for a walk.

Since Roxas couldn't have influenced Riku's decision, it wouldn't be fair to call this mistake number three.

But for all intents and purposes, it was.

* * *

**a/n: Wow, long chapter! And a weird chapter, too. It _does _get the story moving again. You get points if you realized that the interaction with Saix served to illustrate the pieces of advice mentioned in the beginning...those'll definitely be popping up. Hospital? Art show? Riku?! Oh my! **

**In any case, if you're reading this story, or have it on alert, go ahead and leave me a review! Tell me what you think about the chapter and the story in general. (in case you're wondering, I'm feeling insecure about this chapter. But I felt so bad about not posting that I put it up anyway. But never fear, there's always editing. Right? Right? Guys?) **


	8. Across the coals

**a/n: That's right. I updated _twice _in one week, and this is my longest chapter. Like, ever. I just had to update, after that cliffhanger. **

**Anyway, welcome to chapter eight of the Cool Guy. I'd like to thank everybody who reads and reviews this story---your words mean so much to me, and inspire me to write more. I am not a confident writer! So this is important to my creative process. **

**You should all know KH belongs to Square and Disney by now, but I'll say it again anyway. **

* * *

**Chapter Eight**

Xigbar eyed his newest and, though he felt strange in admitting it, favorite tenant.

"Hold out your arms," he said, mouth twisted in careful thought. If he looked closely, the young man in front of him didn't really look _all _that different from before. The hair dye only served to add a whitish shine to his golden color. The difference in the actual hair style, though---whereas before, it had been of the wispy, falling in his face, but still lying flat look; it was now all sweeping layers, angles, and spiked bangs. Xigbar wouldn't go so far as to call him better looking, but it lent itself to the kid's personality quite well. The contacts also made a difference---the vibrant color lit up his face and set off a slight rosy hue to his cheeks that Xig hadn't even noticed before.

The clothes were an after affect, he decided, bringing the whole disguise together. Standing there, even with his arms held out and his face turning red from the exertion of keeping them there; his dark wash levis covering a pair of sharp black shoes and his jacket layering a fitted shirt, Roxas formed a distinct impression, an impression reminiscent but strikingly different from his previous appearance.

"Okay, inspection's over. If he's there, you should do fine. I think…I'm probably the only one who could recognize you."

Roxas dropped his arms to his sides. His hands felt tingly, a sensation that he knew was triggered by a mixture of excitement and nerves.

"Are we ready to go, then?" He asked, taking a quick survey of his apartment. He felt a twinge of guilt when his eyes rested upon the large number of boxes that had yet to be unpacked, and an even bigger twinge when his gaze found the phone.

I'll call her as soon as I've gotten the upper hand, he promised firmly. Knowing his mother, she was probably just teasing him with her dark hints of threats.

Probably.

"Yep. Smile, kid---I have this feeling you'll love Namine's art."

Roxas smiled at the older man who so readily helped him. "I probably will. When I was in highschool I didn't do much talking to other people. But I did talk plenty to paintings."

Talk, scream, point at wildly---Roxas went for the passive explanation.

Xigbar stared at him. The young man's smile had morphed into something of a sheepish grin, and the landlord couldn't help but to bend down and ruffle his hair.

"Paintings, huh?"

"Mm. Scared the daylights out of most people." It certainly had. At the time, Roxas couldn't have cared less about social interaction. It didn't matter if no one got within a fifteen foot radius of him. Hell, that was the way he liked it.

He was mildly depressed that he would not have such a chance tonight, but the idea of catching (No, not catching, he reminded himself. Using the bike meant being subtle in a hundred more ways. It was no use if he caught Axel tonight, but never managed to do it again. He needed to _trap _Axel in a cage of the cool guy's own making) Axel was enough to turn his smile into an effortless one.

* * *

When Roxas walked into the classy white walled gallery with Xigbar at his side, he had to keep from gasping in delight. There was already a substantial amount of people, milling around in small groups and big groups and some by themselves, standing and talking and evaluating the colorful paintings. 

And the paintings! Roxas barely noticed Xigbar's muttered, "Catch ya later," mesmerized by the raw emotion on the walls, staring down at him, washing over him, sometimes cutting him, sometimes making him feel profound and sometimes making him feel like a child again.

He hadn't seen art so original in such a long time.

Roxas looped around the gallery twice, each time noticing that more and more people were filtering in—he saw Axel out of the corner of his eye, but it wasn't time for him to approach him yet.

No. For his plan to work, Axel had to open any conversation they might have.

Eventually he found himself standing in front of what he felt was the most interesting painting of the lot.It was like a locket---if you looked at the shapes one way, it was a generic picture. A picture of exactly what the title suggested.

But if you pried the locket open, you could see the true picture inside.It was beautiful. He wondered vaguely if anybody but he and the artist noticed it.

* * *

"Psst. Axel." 

"I'm right beside you, Demyx. You don't need to whisper."

"But he might hear!"

"Dem. Despite your contrary opinion, Xigbar does _not _have supernatural abilities."

Demyx rolled his eyes. "I don't need your teasing right now, Axel. What am I gonna do? Look at that guy he walked in with---who does he think he is, anyway? Oh. My. God. Axel, what if---what if that guy's his _boyfriend?" _

"What guy are you talking about?"

"That one---see him? The one standing in front of that painting with the thoughtful look on his face---what'll I _do?_ His hair's way cooler than mine!"

Axel paused. "You have a point there. He does have good hair."

"_See?" _Axel's distraught companion said mournfully.

Axel checked a sigh, remembering how easily Demyx got upset. That was why Axel tended to avoid social settings with him---with all the propositions and admirers and, to put it bluntly, shit he had to put up with on a daily basis, he really didn't need the drama that seemed to be produced from some strange reaction between the populace and his cousin's presence. And by populace, he meant everybody they ran in to.

Everybody they ran into normally consisted of Xigbar. Or Zexion. Whichever one had the upper hand in the matter of Dem's affections was normally the one that showed up. Personally, Axel preferred the landlord. It used to be a lot easier to weasel his way out of rent when the landlord thought he was staring down and demanding money from his future cousin in law.

Of course, that perk was gone, so right now Axel couldn't care less that his cousin was attempting to hide behind a statue so he didn't have to deal with his one-eyed ex boyfriend.

Except, Axel admitted grudgingly, Dem _had _helped him unpack. He'd even sent him roses on his birthday.

"Look, it's probably just a random guy. They don't look like a couple to me, Xig's completely abandoned him in any case."

Demyx's face lit up. "You think? But…just to make sure…could you maybe go over and talk to him, Axel? The guy by the painting, just to make sure he doesn't make a move on Xigbar? Please?"

Axel was about to flatly refuse and point out that Demyx would have to learn how to confront his problems eventually, when he made the mistake of looking into the young man's pleading cerulean eyes.

"Sure," he said through gritted teeth.

Because I like talking to random strangers, Demyx. Because, you know, with my infamy, it's so easy for random strangers to turn into those creepy people who try to track down my address and sell snapshots of me to boys and girls between the ages of 12 and 52. That's what makes talking to people fun, he thought sourly.

It wasn't Axel's fault he was popular.

Sure. He loved attention, loved the way every woman in the room was hotly eyeing him from the tips of his silky red hair to the tops of his leather boots, even now as he was walking across the gallery---it was all fluttering eyelashes, discreet---and not so discreet---flashes of cleavage accompanied by small, sensuous waves and husky murmurs by way of greeting.

And if every woman was watching every move he made, half the men were watching him too.

Attention was something that he basked in, something that he wore like a rich and multicolored cape, woven by the dreams of virgins and the lust of men and everything and everybody in between.

He'd be a liar if he said he didn't want it. What he could do without, Axel reflected, was those people who hated him and looked up to him without ever speaking a word to him. What was even worse was those messengers Marluxia kept sending, following him around and so naïve.

If put on the spot, Axel would have to admit that he liked nothing more than surprising people, than being around people who surprised him, than remaining spontaneous, than playing games with rules even he didn't know, and having a good time in general.

And if Axel ever snapped at somebody who was all assumptions, who could blame him?

They would probably have done the same.

Axel looked up. He'd reached the other side of the gallery, where a lone figure was standing with his hands in his pockets, face tilted up to look at one of Namine's less popular pieces.

* * *

Riku was, by most standards, a simple person. He was a music major and played piano in a quaint club on the weekends and worked in a small office during the week. He was fairly intelligent but mainly clever, and was relatively happy with his life in general. 

He lived in a two room apartment, phoned his mother every weekend (unlike other persons), and occasionally went dancing.

Riku is the person who most people would describe as being "wonderful." He had wonderfully green eyes and equally wonderful longish silver hair that had turned heads on more than one occasion.

Admittedly, things had been a little turbulent in his life not too long ago, but he was starting to get back into the swing of things.

To prove to himself how much he was over the event and getting into the swing of the things, he was taking his dog Ether for a long awaited walk through the city park.

Right now he sat on one of the many benches, content to let Ether roll around in the mud that was left from last week's rainstorm. He would shower the yellow labrador-chow mix off when they got home, he figured, stifling a yawn. It had been a particularly trying day of work. Not for the first time, Riku wished he had the skill to play piano full time.

Wrapped in dreams of compositions and fame, Riku didn't notice when Ether's leash caught on the edge of the iron bench.

Fortunately for him, he did notice when the already frayed leash snapped and Ether, seeing the chance for freedom, ran off at as close to lightspeed a one year old energetic male dog could get.He took off after Ether as the large pup dashed madly out of the park and across the street through the open doors of an art gallery.

* * *

"You've been staring at that painting for twenty minutes," Axel said by way of introduction. 

Roxas didn't skip a beat. If he played this perfectly…well. It would be a start.

And even though he wanted to turn to the man who kept a wary three feet away and shake him until he either apologized or explained why he spoke to Roxas in the way that he had, Roxas managed to keep his cool.

He's just that type of guy.

"It doesn't seem like that long to me. Her art is like nothing I've ever seen," Roxas added appreciatively----and truthfully.

"She's good. She puts everything into it, and she's only nineteen."

"Nineteen?" Roxas hadn't known that. His admiration increased. When _he _was nineteen…well. He couldn't have done anything like this. (Of course, he was only two years older, but who was counting?)

Axel didn't make a reply to that, and Roxas went back to his study of the painting. Just standing in the gallery was nostalgic, even if he'd always avoided the opening night of art shows.

The guy started staring at the painting again, completely ignoring Axel. If that kept up, he might well go back over to Xigbar, and then Demyx would never let him hear the end of it.

"What do you see when you look at it?" Roxas asked suddenly.

"When I look at what?" Axel did a double take as emotions flickered across the stranger's oval face. He really did have a nice face, when Axel examined his high cheekbones, small nose, and lips that looked like they were made to pout. His eyes, though---they were bright enough to be nearly unnerving. Axel had never seen anybody with eyes as bright as his own. Was this why people rarely looked him in the eye?

More importantly:

Was Xigbar really charming enough to snag a looker like this? He didn't think so.Was he then essentially wasting his breath on this person?

"The painting. I asked what you see."

That was an odd way to phrase a question, Axel thought, looking at the shorter man. He stopped to ponder his answer before speaking.

"…I see what it is. The rainbow is arcing over the moon."

"I did not mean _that," _the young man said. His words were light, airy, and somehow sharp. His voice wasn't particularly nice, like Axel knew his was, but it had a strange sort of rhythm.

"Really? I don't see what you could be seeing that I'm not."

"I thought that was the point of art."

There was that rhythm again.

Wait a minute.

"Can't you see it's an ocean?"

Was that…?

"Are you speaking in _iambic pentameter?" _

The young man turned and looked at him for the first time. He was smiling.

"Is that your _answer?_ What are you?" He asked.

"Don't you mean _who?"_ Axel stared.

"Nah. I've heard your name already. In my experience, names aren't so important. They can be cast off and given up, exchanged and changed. Quite frankly, I don't give a damn about your name."

Axel was still staring.

"As for the painting…when I look at it, I see blue and I feel a strong wind. Let's say…from the northeast. The stars seem like sand and it's like the waves are running from the moon. It's only a rainbow---" Roxas paused and cocked his head to the left---"If you stare at it straight on, and take it for its face value."

Axel stared some more, but inclined his head to the left.

"Namine…you're a genius," he exhaled. The painting, which he'd always taken for a nighttime sky laced with a stippled rainbow, turned into an expansive, glittering ocean with a white beach.

He really does love art, Roxas thought. The man had a delighted grin on his face.

Maybe, he thought, that was enough interaction for now.

Just as he turned to go, he felt a long fingered hand grip his arm.

"How did you know?" Axel asked.

Roxas thought. It had seemed obvious to him. "I've spent a lot of time looking at paintings," he said, staring pointedly at Axel's hand. It was the same hand that had delicately gripped his chin. Huh.

"Who are you?"

"I told you my opinion on names, didn't I?"

Axel arched a brow. "I wasn't asking for your name."

_I've seen a lot of people try to do what you're suggesting. They are all brilliant people. And you… well, honestly, I'll probably have forgotten all about you by tomorrow._

"What are you asking?" Roxas said breathlessly.

"I want to know who you are. Call it passing curiousity."

_Maybe you'll surprise him…though at this point, I'm doubting it._

"I'm nobody."

"Everybody's somebody." Axel didn't let him go.

_I'd peg you as twenty, twenty-one. You're within your first month of ever living away from your small town family. You have no job. No girlfriend. No raison d'etre…_

"I don't agree," Roxas said slowly. Maybe, he thought, this wasn't a good idea. "You don't know me."

Axel took a look at his face and dropped his hand. "That's why I'm asking. I'm probably just saying this on a whim---because you may know my name but you certainly don't know me, either---but something about you strikes me as interesting."

_And maybe it's because of that. But mostly it's because you're starting to realize that you're a boring person who will live a boring life and nothing interesting will ever, ever happen to you._

"Don't you get it?" Roxas hissed, unable to stop himself. "I'm Ro---"

"ETHER!! HEEL!! NOOOOOO!"

"What the hell?" Axel said. Roxas barely heard him over the shouts and gasps of surprise.

And then, Roxas saw it---a furry, mud-covered mutt was careening around the corner like a bat out of hell, flinging mud onto the white walls and getting dangerously close to the art.

Roxas realized two things in rapid succession:

One: A young woman he was fairly certain was Namine Blanc herself let out a blood curdling shriek of what he assumed was panic and what the people who knew her assumed was the sound Namine made when she was very, _very _furious.

Two: Unless something of considerable bulk got in the way of it, the animal was going pass the corner and in doing so get mud all over the immaculate paintings.

He realized the third just as soon as he saw the young woman stop screaming and instead watch the action---all of it a blur---with eyes that were starting to fill with sparkling tears.

That something would have to be him, Roxas realized.

He bent his knees, waiting for the huge, hyper dog to reach him.

* * *

It's no longer 9:17, but the fire of the life in the night burns on, illuminating the lives of newcomers and oldcomers alike. It's the newcomers who get burned the worst, most nights. Some can't take the heat. And some just can't keep from throwing themselves into it, where they are promptly incinerated or blinded. The wise ones line the infamous ring of flames, watching in awe as the lithe, spry dancers twine like smoke. 

The brightest dancer is a veritable maelstrom of flickering fire, spinning with all the energy of a leaping demon. Nobody, except maybe the victim himself, could have guessed that on one otherwise normal night, Axel would dance closer to the edge than ever before.

So close would he brush the outer circle that the flames covering his person would leap with glee to the one standing there in the hazy, hazy smoke.

Of course, some people still argue that Roxas hadn't been pulled into the flames, but had rather thrown himself into their swirling depths, eyes open and knees braced.

* * *

When Roxas woke up, the first thing that registered was that he had a splitting headache the likes of which he hadn't experienced since that night he decided he wanted to find out what it felt like to be drunk. 

The second thing that registered was a massive amount of people, standing around him in a circle.

"What happened?" He asked, sitting up. There was a pillow under his head. Huh. That was nice.

"You don't remember?" A young girl in a pretty white dress looked at him in concern, hands folded in front of her.

Some of the people murmured in equal worry.

"No…wait." Roxas stood up a little too fast. He sat right back down, seeing a multitude of neon spots. That in itself was weird.

"Oh, be careful, please! You hit your head---thanks to _this _idiot." The girl's tone switched from anxious to waspish.

A man around his age shuffled forward, looking at his shoes. His long layered hair obscured his eyes, but Roxas had the strange feeling he'd seen him somewhere.

"I'm so sorry. My dog Ether got away from me---I hadn't taken him out in a really long time---and he ran in here." The man blushed.

"Oh yeah," Roxas said. The art show. And then, the dog. "Wait! What about the painting?" He asked, standing up slower this time. Ah. That was better. He looked around: so far as he could tell, there wasn't any damage to the artwork.

Good.

"Fine, thanks to you," the girl said, leaning forward to shake his hand. "I'm Namine Blanc. You don't know how grateful I am---you held on to that squirming dog, even after he knocked you down against the corner of the wall. Thank you. It was stupid," her eyes narrowed, "but I can't say I'm not glad."

Roxas blinked. He _knew _her! She had been at the party, the one who'd bit her lip and looked worried the whole time.

He smiled. "No, thank you, for the chance to see your brilliant work. I'd be a fool to not protect it."

The girl blushed. She opened her mouth----and was pushed out of the way by a man with a long scar and eyepatch.

"Don't do something like that ever again! If your madwoman of a mother ever finds out, she'll hunt me down! You had me worried, R--"

Roxas looked at Xigbar, trying to stop the man with the look of utter horror and warning in his eyes.

"R—rascal. You little rascal, scaring your uncle like that."

Roxas started breathing again, and several feet away Demyx's heart leapt in newfound joy.

Then Xigbar was pushed out of the way by yet another person.

"Mr.Mer?" Roxas asked. The slender blue haired man had Axel in tow.

"Please, call me Saix. Sora, what can you tell me about your intense love for art?"

"Excuse me?" And then it dawned on Roxas. "You're---a _journalist?" _

"_Please. _I edit the local newspaper. I think this will make a fantastic article in the culture section---I knew you were different the moment I laid eyes on you."

"I--"

A ripple went through the crowd at that point.

"It _will_ make a good article!"

"Modern day heroics---he could have gotten seriously hurt if he'd been rammed into that window."

"His name's Sora?"

"He also unlocked the secret to Namine's _L'arc de la Luna, _didn't he?"

Roxas paled. He _really, really _didn't like large groups of people. And now they were focusing on him.

"Sora," Someone hissed. "This way."

* * *

"Thank you," Roxas said, breathing deeply. 

"Not at all." Axel sat down on the curb beside him. "I can't stand crowds either," he said distantly. "What you did…"

"Yeah?"

"Was completely idiotic."

"Yeah," Roxas laughed.

Laughing with the enemy now? He must have hit his head pretty hard.

"You feel like answering my question now?"

"What question was that?"

"Who are you."

"Ah." Roxas thought for a moment, spying the alleyway where he'd dropped off his clothes and clipboard earlier that evening. It was time to strike, he decided. "Sure. Can you wait right here?"

"What?" Axel seemed surprised. People probably didn't often ask him to wait, Roxas reflected.

"It's your choice."

"…you'll come back, right?"

"Sure I will."

"Fine, then."

Score, Roxas thought.

* * *

**a/n: Roxas, you are a naughty naughty boy. Axel has feelings too. Probably. ::cough:: ahem: Yes, I know Roxas wasn't really speaking in iambic pentameter. Axel just thought he was.No, I haven't forgotten about all those weird questions Roxas asked Larxene---he's saving them for more important moments. No, I hadn't exactly planned that---when I finally put Roxas and Axel together, it's just what happened. Hmm...I hope this chapter was okay...**

**Anyway, if you've got anything to say about this story----especially if you have it on alert! Because there are thirty of you! (wouldn't it be nice if I heard from all of you?)---then please leave me a review telling me what you think, even if it's just two words. **

**Thank you for reading. **

**(This ending's kind of a cliff hanger too, isn't it? Huh...)**


	9. So much for wit

**a/n: I am sooo spoiling you guys. But after getting the most reviews ever for the last chapter, I wanted to thank you. (pssst! chapters come quicker if you review!) So here's chapter nine, only one week after chapter eight:D In here we have thinking and doubting and even Marluxia. Yay! I feel like things are really starting to shape up. **

**Anyway, as you know, KH is the property of Disney and Square. **

* * *

**Chapter Nine**

In all his excitement, Roxas almost tripped in retrieving the bag containing his normal clothes and his clipboard. It was very sobering to have his nose come uncomfortably close to the pavement, a gut wrenching sensation that brought with it a multitude of equally gut wrenching worries.

What if Axel left before he got back?

And what if Axel _hadn't _left before he got back?

What if Axel saw completely through his disguise and got mad? Hell, Roxas would be furious in his place….but, then again, Axel had no reason to trick Roxas.

Just like he had no reason to speak to him so harshly.

I'm well within my rights, Roxas thought. If Axel was civil, if Axel was a normal human being, the situation wouldn't have even arisen. The bastard brought it upon himself.

And yet, the trusting look in his eyes…

Roxas shook his head furiously, shrugging out of his clothes after casting a quick glance around. He barely spared a thought to wonder at where his inhibitions had flown away to.

He brought it upon himself, Roxas thought firmly, stepping into his normal outfit.

It only took him two minutes to scrub his hair to its lackluster state and dress in his regular dull clothing. He shoved "Sora's" attire into the bag and picked up the clipboard, hiding it behind his back before walking out of the mouth of the alley---Axel was sitting on the curb with his back to him.

Roxas watched him watch the stars. There weren't many in the city, not really enough to waste your time on.

Then he cleared his throat, ever so softly. And in the dim light from the lamps high above he started to read.

"Axel. You have a cold exterior but I love you anyway. I hope someday you'll feel the same way."

Roxas tried to keep the disgust out of his voice.

Axel's head turned. The movement was impossibly slow, as if time flowed differently for the red haired man.

"You'll never know me, but that's okay. I'll just send you these posies and hope you'll have a good day….even though I believe to the bottom of my heart that we'd be perfect for each other."

His head was still turning. Roxas didn't realize that Axel wasn't moving slowly, he was reading so quickly his words were stumbling over themselves, running into each other in a breathless, convoluted line.

"Not everybody gives roses for love. You're a jackass and I hope I see your funeral."

"Have a nice life."

"I like your hair."

Axel was starting to stand up now.

"They say I'll be getting out of the hospital soon. I know how ridiculous it is for me to send you a message. You hate them so much. I wonder if the guy will even be able…to find you. It's harder than it looks."

And that was the end. Roxas exhaled giddily---only to inhale with fright at Axel's threatening proximity. The man's eyes were burning into his own. Don't recognize me, Roxas thought. Don't recognize me, don't recognize me…

"Are you done?" He asked softly.

Roxas is, really, a unique person. A person with a quick temper, and a tongue to match. It's a facet of his personality that his mother cursed and his fellow students used to marvel at. I say this only so you know how much fury his words were laced with when he replied:

"No. No, I am not _done. _I won't be done until the day _I get fired_, let me assure you. I have several things to say to you--" Roxas paused, realizing his voice was shaking.

He opened his mouth to speak, but Axel cut him off.

"Amazing. He already snagged a new kid."

Roxas blinked. "You don't _remember _me?" He hissed. He did, of course, remember Axel's assertion that he certainly wouldn't. But he hadn't really believed he'd made so little an impression.

Axel's blank face was answer enough.

"If you're waiting for someone," Roxas said finally, forcing as much ice as he could into the words, "I wouldn't stay long."

Axel only had time to raise his eyebrows and reach out before Roxas turned on his heel and walked hurriedly away.

If Axel wasn't so preoccupied with thoughts of Sora, he might have recognized that gait. If the sun had been shining on his hair, rather than the vague yellow glow of the street lamps, it would have been game over for Roxas.

He didn't.

It wasn't.

Axel sat back down on the curb and waited---firm chin in one languid hand and two eyes bright with anticipation.

* * *

Roxas stumbled into the flower shop well after midnight. He really didn't know why the door was still unlocked, and he didn't want to know--- Marluxia was watering the plants in the back of the room, paying delicate attention to every spring green leaf. It only took Roxas a cursory glance to see that he was the only one there. 

"Jack," he said calmly. "I can't say it hasn't been interesting, but since you failed, I'm afraid I have to--"

"Here's the clipboard. I read him the messages at Namine Blanc's art show."

Marluxia dropped his watering can. Roxas looked down and watched the chemically enhanced liquid seep across the floor, missing the look of utter shock aimed at his head.

By the time he looked up, it was replaced with a self-satisfied grin.

"Lark's not lost her touch at all, then. Good job, Roxas. Come get your paycheck."

Roxas stared. "You just called me Roxas," he said numbly.

"I think you're imagining things, Jack," Marluxia snipped, but he was still smiling.

"I've only been working for two days…" Roxas hesitated. Marluxia was pulling out an envelope and writing down an amount that couldn't be right on a pink check.

"Messenger boys get paid for every successful task. I told you it's the most coveted job in the city, didn't I?"

"And the most looked down upon," Roxas intoned, remembering.

"I won't ask how a fellow like you managed it. I'll just tell you to do it again tomorrow. Here."

Roxas took the check between stiff fingers.

At least he didn't have to worry about money for awhile.

But…

"Why are you here so late?" Roxas asked, bracing himself for a nonsensical answer.

Marluxia cocked his head, a gesture that wouldn't have looked quite so elegant on anybody but his effeminate employer: several strands of his pastel hair escaped from behind his ears, falling to grace his porcelain, smoothly curved cheek. He shifted his position, leaning over to pick up the watering can, and smiled.

"Tonight is special," he said vaguely.

"Okay." Roxas nervously put a hand behind his head. "What do you mean?"

"Follow me."

Roxas started for the door Marluxia had dragged him through last time, to be met with his employer's aggravated sigh.

"No, not _that_ door, this way." Marluxia gestured towards a set of double doors on the other side of the shop.

Roxas opened his mouth, shut it, and opened it again. "Were those doors always there?" He asked.

Marluxia gave him a strange look. "Not very attentive, Jack?"

"I used to think so," Roxas admitted, dumbfounded as he tried to remember their earlier state of existence.

"No matter, follow me."

Roxas obliged. The room he walked in to was decidedly colder than the shop itself, and the ceiling was made of panels of green and blue glass, as were three of the inwardly curving walls. It was quite lovely, and quite spooky as well.

Like the rest of the building, the floor space was packed with plants, only here there seemed to be just one variety. It was spread all across the room, rising knee high and dark green. The leaves held themselves higher than the springy bottom, and while it was nice, Roxas didn't understand the point.

"It looks just like grass, except for the leaves," he said.

"Exactly."

"Huh?"

"That's why tonight is special…watch, the moon's finally coming out from behind the clouds."

Roxas watched.

"The seeds were a present from a friend of mine, named Saix. They're unique to his hometown, and I've never seen a night-blooming species quite like it. Every time I see him I ask how he could have ever torn himself from the sight to come here. He says not everybody is obsessed with flowers. Well, Jack, what do you think?"

Whatever thoughts he had had about Marluxia being a shady person were swept away in the time it took for the buds he hadn't noticed before to unfurl and reveal pinwheel sized, sweet smelling blossoms of every color he could name and a few he couldn't.

"How are there so many?" He breathed.

"They're called L'arc de la Luna. According to Saix, they've been genetically altered. Pretty, n'est-ce pas?"

"No wonder he sounded bitter," Roxas said, registering Namine's inspiration. "If there had been anything so beautiful about _my _hometown…I wouldn't have left."

He was shaken out of his reverie by Marluxia's striking laugh. "You're full of surprises tonight, Jack! How did you _ever _capture the attention of Saix Mer?"

"I don't actually know. He almost knocked me over in the street."

"Hmm…well, there they go, the coy things."

Roxas watched the blooms retreat once in more in a sluggish wave. "They don't bloom for very long," he remarked.

"And only once a year."

"Once a year?!" Roxas spluttered.

"I told you tonight was special. Now, I think I'm going to lock up. Come on then, I'll grab you the next messages while I'm at it."

"Thank you for showing me," Roxas said quietly.

Marluxia shrugged. "You were there."

"Story of my life."

"At least you're never bored, then." Marluxia locked the double doors with a large, silver key.

"Marluxia?"

The man swung back around, shucking his apron off and onto one of the hooks in the wall.

"Why does Axel hate you so much?" Roxas didn't really expect his theory to be correct, until Marluxia froze for an instant.

"He doesn't hate me, he just hates what I do to him."

"And what do you do?"

"I send you, of course. I used to do it all myself, you know. But I'm getting old."

"You're not a day over twenty five," Roxas scowled.

"Jack. I've been doing this for six years. I know what you're really trying to ask."

"And why's that?" Roxas's scowl deepened. He took back his newfound trust.

"Because they all ask the same thing. Larxene…no, _he _was the most dramatic about it. Crying and flailing, almost drowning, he was." He tilted his head again. "I don't think anyone else has been quite as _angry _as you, Jack. And that's saying something. You shouldn't take it personally. What you want to know is, why does he dismiss you like he does? Right?"

"Something like that." The smaller man folded his arms across his chest.

"I'm afraid it's just one of those things you have to work through yourself. You know…" Marluxia hesitated, eyeing the messenger boy sharply. "I take back what I said to you before. About not having what it takes." Marluxia handed him back the clipboard. "Have at it, then."

* * *

Axel did not have as bad a night as one might think. Obviously Sora had had an engagement come up while he was gone, and so Axel only ended up waiting an hour before finding Xigbar and demanding his nephew's phone number. 

"Nephew?" Xigbar said blankly.

"Yes. Your nephew. Yea tall, saved the day, etc?"

"Ohh…you mean _that_ nephew. Heh. Sure, Axel. Wait, why don't you just ask him yourself?"

Axel's eye twitched. "He had to leave, and then I was ambushed by one of those goddamn pawns."

"How reckless _is_ that kid?!" Xigbar exclaimed.

"Hey, calm down Xig, I'm sure he's fine by himself at night."

"Uh…yeah, right."

Axel frowned. "You're acting strange."

"Shhh! Demyx might hear you." Xigbar looked around wildly.

Axel rolled his eyes in ill concealed frustration. He toyed with the idea of telling Xigbar that that had been Demyx's exact response earlier in the evening, dropping it almost immediately. They didn't deserve it, not when they both specialized in wasting his time. It was especially hard to forgive the landlord, who wasn't nearly as adorable as his cousin.

"Whatever. Listen, just give me his phone number."

"Okay, there's no need to snap. What's got you so pissed off?"

"He said he'd come back, okay? And he didn't."

Xigbar blinked. "Oh. Well…I think you'll find that he disappears sometimes."

"Thanks," Axel said shortly, taking the scrap of paper the flustered landlord offered him.

He went to congratulate Namine one more time before vacating the area, feeling strangely disappointed. He didn't even feel like taking someone home with him, instead parting from the crowd of offers with an apologetic smile.

* * *

"Hi mum. I know. You were about to track me down and set me on fire. Yeah. Yeah. Uh-huh. Ye---_no._ I'm not coming back. Actually, I have got a job. It pays quite well. What do I do? Um. It's sort of free lance work…I…uh, I find people. Yes. No, not like a private investigator, but I guess you could call it that. Friends? Actually…yes. No, heh, they're not paintings. My landlord---he looks likes a pirate---is really nice. So is this girl I know who works at a bookstore. No, I don't think it would work out between us, somehow. Tell Hayner I say hi too. Oh, he and Olette got together? How nice for them. Yes, I think that's _nice. _No. I don't know any other girls. Mum, I don't really like girls. No! I didn't mean it like _that!_ I'm sure I'll find one eventually. I'm not exactly looking. Okay. Sure. Yeah, I'm all unpacked. It's been three days, mum, of course I am. I must not know the streets too well yet? You'd be surprised…oh, nothing. I love you too. Your good china? Of course I'm using it…" Roxas cringed. "Of course. Bye." 

After putting down the phone Roxas took in the horrible state of his apartment. The boxes hadn't been moved since he'd lugged them up the stairs, the walls had prints on them (left from the previous tenant. He didn't want to think about it.) and there was dust on _everything. _In the corners, on the window sill, not even the ceiling had escaped. He'd only set foot in the bathroom once, but it wasn't better off, not by any means.

If Roxas hadn't grown up in a nigh immaculate environment then it wouldn't have bothered him as much as it did. If he had spent more than a grand total of twelve hours in the apartment---eleven of which he'd slept through---he would have cleaned it already.

As it was he sighed and started unpacking.

He took out his clothes, and hung his wardrobe up in the closet, putting considerable space between the clothes he was going to use as Sora and his own.

Next came his books, which took twice as long. It was strange how the only furniture that didn't have any dust on it was the two piece set of shelves, tucked into the back corner of the room. Apparently Axel was an avid reader? Roxas frowned.

He didn't really know that much about Axel.

Roxas wondered, suddenly, how long the man had waited for him. An hour? Three? All night?

So what if it was, Roxas thought. This is strictly business.

Strictly business? A nasty voice in his head snipped. It seems to me like you're making this a personal vendetta. You were _happy _to think that he waited a long time. And do you know where personal vendettas lead, Roxas? They lead to issues and obsessions and all sorts of things which in connection to Axel would be horrific. They lead to all sorts of things you've learned to _avoid. _To drama, to trauma, to pure unadulterated _hell._

It's my _job_, Roxas snapped.

Just make sure you keep it that way, the voice admonished.

Roxas continued his unpacking in a foul mood.

* * *

A few hours passed before his landlord stuck his head through the door. 

"Hey, Roxy, wanna come get some---holy shit!"

"What?" Roxas's head snapped up from his novel. Xigbar was turning in a small circle, clearly dazed. "Your room is..._sparkly," _He said.

Roxas laughed at the clear distrust in his voice. "That's because I dusted. And vacuumed. And polished. And dusted again, because trust me, once was not enough."

"It looks nice. Kind of creepy, though. I'm used to wading through filth if I wanna drag a tenant out."

Cleaning wasn't the only thing Roxas had done. He'd moved the sporadically placed furniture, organized the few knickknacks he had scattered around---including but not limited to his collection of comic books, photos from home, a geo Hayner had given him, and other trinkets that had caught his eye---and opened all the curtains, letting the room be soaked in light for probably the first time since the walls were put in.

Fully cleaned and tidy as could be, it was actually quite livable.

Roxas wrinkled his nose. "I believe it. So, what did you want?"

"I just thought you'd like to come to lunch with me, meet some of my friends, that sort of thing."

"Do you mind if I go as Sora?" Roxas asked, realizing another valuable opportunity.

Xigbar frowned, a small shadow flickering across his dark eyes. "Whatever floats your boat, Roxy," he said. "Meet me downstairs, okay?"

"Sure."

* * *

"Sora. Guess you're not home. That's some disappearing act you've got…but I didn't see it quite clear enough. How about you show me again tonight? I'll be at club 13. Your good old uncle knows where it is if you don't. I want to see you again… I meant every word, you know. And…heh, now I'm trying to think about something clever to close with. So much for wit. Bye for now."

* * *

**a/n: you can probably expect chapter 10 (oh my god, double digits coming up!) fairly quickly, regardless of the number of reviews. Next up we meet Zexion, I think. **

**I'd also like to apologize for the crappy flower scene...hmm...what else should I be telling you right now... this chapter was actually kind of tame, wasn't it? I'll make up for it in the next one, don't you worry. So, did anyone else feel sorry for Axel? raises hand Poor guy has no idea what he's getting into. Then again, neither does Roxas. Mwahahaha. Should we put it past Axel to jump Roxas at the club? XD**

**Anyway...more people have this on alert now! Isn't that awesome? I'd love to hear from some of you I haven't heard from before. I want to know what you're thinking! **


	10. Conviction

**a/n: Hello and welcome to chapter 10 of The Cool Guy! Double digits, isn't that exciting? Don't you think? Okay, yeah. I was gone for a REALLY long time. And I'm really sorry about it...especially because I had 98 percent of this already written. But now I'm really anxious to get through the thick of the story...and I think this chapter marks the start of the middle, which is the thick of the plot, if that makes any sense. So...Roxas comes to some realizations, Axel does too...and in the next chapter, we'll have both of them in the same room again. I really appreciate all the people who've been reviewing this, and have this on alert; and I hope you enjoy reading. **

* * *

**Chapter 10**

His time spent with Xigbar's friends had definitely been socially awkward.

* * *

"I'm serious, Lux---it was like, time slowed down! There was the dog, and there was Sora, scrawny and standing with his knees braced and this awesome expression on his face---tell him, Sora!" 

Roxas smiled lopsidedly. The lanky young man, with his open grin and soon discovered habit of slinging a casual arm over people's shoulders, had taken to him like a bird to air. Roxas supposed he had taken to him as well, finding in him none of the malice he had been imagining after the night Demyx had proudly looked down on him and proclaimed himself to be Axel. He saw neither hint nor hair of that cold arrogance; perhaps it had simply been the way he was standing…

"Anyone would have done the same thing," He calmly assured his skeptic coworker. It wouldn't do for Sora to come off as boastful, not at all, but he kept a blush to his words to avoid false modesty.

Xigbar had dragged him excitedly, not to a café---for which he was grateful, Roxas was getting sick of them---but to a quiet, pleasant bistro. He had been surprised to see Xaldin and Luxord, who both worked at the flower shop, contentedly bantering with Saix, Demyx, and a pale young man whose name he didn't know.

"It's Zexion," he'd said when introductions were being made (Roxas had held his breath at the sharp gazes of Xaldin and Luxord, but they both accepted his identity) and apart from raising an eyebrow during Demyx's wild retelling of the art show, had said nothing.

And it might have been Roxas's imagination, but was that cold stare glaring at his landlord, beneath the silver fringe of half-lowered lashes?

"So, Sora, what kind of work do you do?" Luxord asked interestedly. "I'm guessing you're a tad more successful than your Uncle, eh?"

Roxas almost dropped his iced tea, fingers going suddenly numb.

"I'm plenty successful," Xigbar muttered hotly; Roxas caught him steal a glance at Demyx.

"I'm sort of a, you know, jack-of-all-trades," he said, wondering what the hell kind of social dynamics were at work with this group of people. Every five seconds someone was shooting someone a glance laced with cryptic meaning, or kicking someone under the table, and whenever Roxas moved he felt as if all eyes were on him, as they were now.

"Nothing bet-worthy, then?" Luxord leaned forward, chin in hand, and Roxas recognized that he was being sized up.

Sized up in regards to what, well, he didn't know.

"Not really."

Roxas maintained a detachedly agreeable tone, but Luxord still exchanged a few mental words with Xaldin, who sat to his direct left. From what Roxas could gather, those two were thick as thieves, as was Xaldin with Xigbar, Xigbar with Demyx, or maybe Demyx was closer to Zexion? It was, of course, not explained, and Roxas could only guess.

And they all seemed, with the perhaps-exception of Zexion, to want Sora for a friend.

As the lunch proceeded Roxas was given ample opportunity to flesh out Sora's existence to the world---

Where did he come from, Demyx inquired.

"A small island off the coast; it was just me, my parents, and a few other families."

What had he studied, Saix pressed, surely he had a degree…?

"I went to college for two years, studying mostly art and English…it was great, at first. But one day I woke up and realized that I wasn't doing anything. What would I be able to look back on with fondness, with pride? Nothing. After that, every hour I spent there was an eternity, until I decided to come here..."

"That's certainly…an interesting view."

Roxas didn't like the way the editor, with a pen tucked into his silky blue hair---today he had pulled it back from his angular face, it made him look even sharper---stared at him after that particular speech.

It wasn't like it was _his _view, exactly. Roxas had scoffed at the idea of more school, and his mum had balked at the thought of paying for it. No, it was strictly a part of Sora---Sora, who had to be somewhat more involved in art than simply admiring and pouring his heart out to paintings.

"So you work with art, then, right?" Demyx smiled at him, and…yes, there was the arm again, a strangely heavy weight hanging across Roxas's shoulders. Immediately after the contact, Roxas looked up—he felt as if someone had walked across his grave!---to meet Zexion's steely grey glare.

"You could say that," Roxas said, covering his unease by taking another sip of iced tea. What was this guy's problem, anyway? His constant watching, without ever speaking a word, was getting under his skin.

It reminded him of himself.

"A freelancer, then?" Xaldin's low growl was somehow friendly in nature. His voice could be easily construed as seductive, Roxas thought suddenly; the man could have worked recording cheap romance novels if he wanted. Still Roxas couldn't help but feel intimidated.

"Y-yes."

"It's a noble enough profession, but do you think you'll be able to find work here? There's heavy competition."

"Oh, I know. But I think I'll be able to find _something._ Everyone seems very…friendly."

A hearty laugh flung itself around the table---Roxas snapped his head round, catching the window that looked out over the busy street within his sights, but there was no lightning to be had.

"Your nephew here, he's naïve, isn't he?" Luxord seemed to take great pleasure in drawling the syllables out.

"He's not as naïve as you'd think," the landlord answered, looking at Roxas with an emotion he couldn't quite name in his dark eye. Roxas didn't linger on his gaze.

"Who is?" Saix scribbled something onto a small pad of paper; when Demyx leaned over to peer at it the editor swiftly---but nonchalantly---covered it with his sleeve. "Still---he is refreshing, isn't he?"

Roxas blinked. Did it even matter, the fact that he was sitting with them instead of standing against them? They were judging him, just the same as they had before. What gave them the right?

Who did they think they were?

Who did they think he was?

(And who the hell did _he_ think he was, but that question, for the moment, could be put aside.)

"Refreshing. I can agree with that."

"Like a breath of fresh water!"

"Air, Demyx, you mean air."

Roxas stood up, shrugging off Demyx's arm.

"I…I need to get some. Air. I need to get some air."

* * *

In retrospect, Roxas thought, sitting idly in his apartment and staring at the blinking red light of his answering machine with eyes he knew were brighter for the fact that he'd been in desperate need of nourishment (coffee was nice, but there was a lot more to be said for something substantial, like the roast beef French dip Xigbar had treated him to), nothing in his life could really be described as _not _being socially awkward. 

The light flashed. In agreement? Roxas shook his head, running a hand through his haystack colored locks. Of their own accord his fingers twisted the strands and yanked them lightly.

He'd just listened to Axel's message. If he'd known who it'd been from, he probably would have done well to put it off until later that evening. The way things were sitting, all he could do was hang over the edge of the couch---a green, paisley sort of affair that made Roxas wonder if Xiggy had picked out the furniture for the rooms himself---and try to fight off the nasty little thoughts that were running rampant little cycles in his head.

Roxas didn't know if it was the phone, his own shoddy hearing, or circumstance that had led to the strange quality of tone in the message. Axel had started out in the same suave, over the top voice he was---insert a shudder here---starting to get used to.

But halfway through Axel's words started getting a whole lot less cool and whole lot more something Roxas really, really didn't want to contemplate too much, dissolving until at the end, his voice was soft, earnest, a million other things that reminded Roxas more of Hayner than anything else.

Roxas sighed, and decided to evaluate the situation once more.

On the one hand, a meeting with Axel was excellent---the phone call had been exactly the follow up Roxas had been hoping for, a hook into Axel's life. He could show up as Sora, apologize, and socialize with Axel---if he could set up another time to interact, well, that'd be great. Then he could disappear and come back as Roxas, armed with the new batch of messages.

On the other hand, Axel was throwing a wrench into Roxas's plans with this whole, "I'm sincere and find you interesting" thing. Because Roxas was a good judge of character, and because Roxas could be and was conniving when he wanted to be, he was well aware that Axel really was sincere about that part.

And Roxas was smart enough to advance relations in his mind until he saw the day when interest would turn into friendship (on Axel's part, of course, Roxas hated the bastard). And Roxas was smart enough to know that eventually, Axel would find out that his friend didn't actually exist, and Axel would feel betrayed. Betrayed, and probably a lot more than that.

Roxas isn't _stupid. _He could see that just as well as you and I, in case you were thinking that it would come to him as a shock.

Roxas sighed again, then once more for good measure. Whatever Axel had done to him certainly didn't beget what he was setting him up for later. He'd replayed the message four times to be positive about that---and yes.

Each time brought with it a whole new level of queasiness. A sharp twisting in his stomach.

Why?

Well. In his mind, Roxas was the good guy here. Axel was like—Grendel. Sure, Roxas wouldn't feel any qualms about ripping his arm off, but messing with his head? A little switching, that was okay. That would have been fine. But fucking over someone who---Roxas was sure, after hearing those last words---wanted to see you as a friend?

Roxas just didn't see himself as that type of guy.

His eye fell upon the clip board, it was laying across his knees and the stark white of the paper drew his gaze further down the lines, jumping on the words that relayed so many emotions, all over just one man.

_I used to like you, you know…I would have forgiven you…but, my sister? Why did you have to pick her? And why won't you talk to me now? I hate you! I hate you! I hate…_

Roxas twitched. He must have made Sora too nice, it was messing with his convictions…to think, he'd been considering showing sympathy…was he insane?

"I need to get out," he informed the paisley green couch, and fled the apartment lest it reply, or, even worse, lest Axel call again.

* * *

"Axel speaking, what can I do for you?" 

"Axel? Axel?! EEeeee! It really _is _your number! I--"

Axel slammed the phone on the receiver, none too gracefully. It bounced a little and fell off the edge of his cluttered desk, swinging dejectedly by its off white cord.

Demyx looked up from his videogame at the noise, wary. "Axel?"

Axel looked at his cousin, trying not to shoot him a glare. (He wasn't mad at Demyx, anyway, just everybody else. It was impossible to be mad at Demyx.) (Scratch that, it was simple to be mad at Demyx, but Axel felt guilty every time he was.)

Demyx took the look as an invitation to continue. "You seem…twitchy today."

"It's Tuesday," Axel shrugged, letting Dem contemplate that and stalking into the kitchen. He cast an eye around for the cereal box.

It was nowhere to be found.

And Axel resisted the urge to yell at his cousin for forgetting to do the stupid shopping; because he wasn't mad at Demyx.

Who was he mad at? Well. He was mad at Xigbar; for freaking out on him just because he hadn't turned in his room key.

He was mad at Marluxia; for being a manipulative bastard.

But mostly, he had to admit, Axel was mad at himself for moping around an empty apartment (Demyx didn't count; socially) and jumping every time the phone rang like a hyperactive teenage girl with her first crush. And Axel didn't have a crush. He preferred sex to feelings, numerous partners to one, caprice to convention. He'd been around the block a few times, hell; people ran around the block just to catch a glimpse of him. Axel didn't get crushes. True love were two words that hardly made sense alone, never mind together. He should just calm down, get some work done, and forget he'd ever met that ki--

_Ring. __Ri__---_

"Hello?" Axel answered, breathless.

"Did you order a--"

"No!" Axel snarled. He hung up, running a frantic hand through his hair. Was he insane? Getting so worked up over the phone ringing…

Demyx surveyed the wreckage left behind by Axel's wild, long-legged leap from the middle of the kitchen tiles to the wall in the other room where the phone now swung slowly, eyes wide and curious. He hadn't seen his cousin lose his cool like this since they were in middle school and he'd had a crush on Kairi, the girl with the pretty red hair...Demyx giggled, imagining Sora with bright red spikes...and then regretted it when Axel's eyes swung around at him, back to normal.

"I need to get out," he informed Demyx, and strode out the door and down the stairs quickly, lest he snap at his dumbfounded cousin.

* * *

**a/n: So...not a lot happening, in terms of action. This was more a decision-making character-building chapter. Don't worry, I wouldn't give you guys the parallels without actually using them, so you can probably imagine what _might _happen next. Or can you? cough Anyway, I'd love to hear from you guys, who knows, the chapter might come really quickly if I feel inspired by readers...(hint, hint) Also! I highly recommend, if you like high school-ish fics, checking out So Much For That. It's really shaping up and is written in a style very different from this story; you might like it. 'til the next update, then! **


	11. Acting

**a/n: Hello and welcome to chapter eleven of The Cool Guy! Before you start reading, I'd like to make an important announcement:**

**I am looking for someone to work on a collaboration with. I imagine most people would like to work within this fandom, and I am completely up for that, but I wouldn't mind working outside those parameters, either. Now, I do have a few requirements, and that's that I'd like someone somewhat dedicated, and willing to do maybe...a chapter a week? I'd also like someone who has a bit of experience in writing narratives. If you are interested, then by all means please note me or mention it in your review; I'll take a look at your work and get back to you quickly. Thanks for your time! **

**Anyway, as you all know, KH is the property of Disney and Square. I hope you enjoy the chapter. :)**

* * *

**Chapter Eleven**

At least, Roxas reflected as he wandered aimlessly on the edge of the inter city park, there were no couches outside, and (more importantly) no phone, which meant there was no red blinking light on the phone that contained hell-bent messages.

There were, however, pigeons.

_Everywhere._

And they were freaking him out.

He cursed his small stature---he had never liked being short, (and even though in all actuality Roxas was merely average, he had somehow managed to live his life surrounded by tall people, so it amounted to the same thing) and now his height seemed to induce the bloated gray beasts to follow him around, as if he was their kindred spirit.

Or an easy target. Roxas winced. There were six or seven, hopping alongside him. He'd offered up a quickly bought sandwich to them, hoping they would be satisfied and leave him alone. Instead they'd devoured the morsel and were now looking up at him with their hungry black eyes. Stupid pigeons.

He quickened his pace. The park he was shadowing was actually quite quaint; very open and harboring dozens of huge trees with broad, dark green leaves, obviously planted more than a generation before. There was more than one couple out walking through the foliage, and even more people were leading their dogs around. Roxas made a mental note of the location---it seemed like a good place to meditate on the universe and his questionable (oh, so questionable) place in it, providing he could avoid the clingy lovers. It wouldn't be so hard. He'd just have to frequent the areas that were out in plain view.

Avoiding people had always come naturally to him. It might have been a side effect of his lifelong desire to, for the most part, be let alone to do his own thing. No one had ever interested him enough to spend ample amounts of time with, Hayner being the main exception, but Hayner was eight hundred miles away in that god-forsaken backwater town.

And here he was.

All by himself in the god-forsaken city. Well, not quite all by himself. The pigeons were still there.

"Look. I'm sure you're not all that bad. But why won't you just stop following me? Please? All I want to do is be left alone. Surely you can understand that. Give up before I throw a stick at you," Roxas added sternly, staring at the birds. "If you knew my state of mind," he warned, "you'd fly away."

They flew away. Roxas gaped, half standing in consternation. Was he telekinetic? All these years, when he could have exercised the will of his mind upon other objects? He could have mentally delivered the messages, he mused, a smile creeping onto his face as he took the game further---he could have stopped that dog without risking bodily harm.

He could have kept that box from slipping out of his fingers.

"I know the sentiment."

Of course he hadn't been the one to scare away the pigeons, he didn't have the height, judging from the shadow he had just noticed, that this person did. With a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, Roxas turned his head so slowly he was surprised it made no creaking noise, hoping beyond hope that somewhere in the city was a person other than Axel who commanded that cool, languid voice.

But Roxas had never possessed a shred of luck, and he was given none at that instant. Or maybe he _was_ lucky. After all, he'd left the house as Sora. Of course, if he hadn't, then maybe he could have made a run for it. Jumped the fence around the park. Feigned a heart attack, or something logical like that. As it was he suppressed the blaze of flushed anger he felt for the man, and reached for what he hoped was a smile of pleasant surprise.

"When did you get here?" Roxas decided to ask. The question seemed safe enough. He was inwardly suspicious of that clear-green gaze, the one that was now memorizing him from upright head to loosely planted foot. What the intent of the look on Axel's face was, Roxas didn't know.

For a moment the tall (should be illegal to be that tall, Roxas thought with envy) red-haired man merely stood, with the smallest smile lifting the corners of his mouth. He was dressed casually today, Roxas noted, the straight-legged jeans were loose around his hips and frayed where the distressed ends met his faded sneakers.

He looked like he'd just thrown his clothes on, too; the green sweater that hung from his lithe frame was slightly askew off the shoulder, making the thin white shirt underneath visible.

Like this, his normally garish hair whipping his pale forehead with the force of the breeze which had just picked up, slightly disheveled and without the classy posse surrounding him, he almost seemed like a normal person.

Almost.

It was probably just because he hadn't yet opened his mouth to say something else that contradicted his previous degrading speech, just because, Roxas finally saw, those eyes weren't harsh on their own. In this light they seemed neither kind nor malicious, merely two reflective orbs that harbored only the desire to better see the smaller blonde in front of him.

In the absence of words, Roxas couldn't stop himself from tilting his head to follow the green gaze up, up, and up into the tree branches. The menace's eyes were the exact shade of the light that was filtering through above.

"You've never been here before, have you?" Axel asked, voice soft, even softer than when he'd been whispering in the art gallery. His eyes flecked back to stare straight into Roxas's, and the shorter young man fought to keep from flinching at the scrutiny---Axel had seen Roxas last, not Sora, after all. He covered the instinct by focusing on Axel's eyelashes. Did all red-heads have lashes that peculiar autumn-drenched color? Was he really seeing a smattering of subtle freckles dashed across that ivory skin, or was that merely an extension of the dappled light?

Axel raised an eyebrow, and Roxas remembered to shake his head.

"I didn't think so."

Roxas stood dumbfounded, and crossed his arms. It was a little cold in the shade.

"Aren't you going to ask where I went?" He pondered aloud, mouth suddenly dry.

And when he spoke something seemed to break. The softness of the enchanted scene receded in a wave that Roxas was pretty sure only he found audible.

"Aren't you going to tell me?" Axel returned, his voice back to normal. Roxas found himself relaxing in his renewed resolve. When had his knees locked, anyway?

No, Roxas was about to say, until he realized that Sora wouldn't answer that way.

What would Sora do?

Well, that depended on why Sora would have disappeared. And Sora wouldn't have disappeared for the same reason Roxas did, obviously.

"I don't mean to pressure you or anything, it's fine. Things come up, I know. I'm glad to see you now, anyway."

And he was. The half-smile----well, not quite a half-smile; Roxas decided the term was altogether lacking clarity in this instance. Axel was not half smiling, his naturally pale rose lips instead made the tiniest upward curve on the left side, more of a gentle, teasing twist, really---- was a constant presence rather than a reaction to Roxas's flustered question, as if a huger delight was lurking just under it, ready to come out as soon as Roxas assured him it was safe, that it wouldn't be chased away like last time.

Why the wary smile? It didn't suit him at all…or maybe it did, Roxas thought with renewed distaste. Maybe that was how he lured people in, a charming smile to trick them so he could use them for his own questionable purposes…

"So what were you doing, anyway?" Axel lowered himself onto the bench, wrapping his arms around the back and crossing his long legs.

Roxas was helpless. He didn't want to sit down and talk to Axel here, under the trees. He wanted to mentally prepare himself for the counterattack, arm himself, and lie in wait for the enemy in its own territory, one of those horrible chic clubs where the lighting was sufficient camouflage for most. That was where the war was, after all. He could have handled a light skirmish in a restaurant, even, but here?

Out in the open, in the middle of the morning, when his only intention had been to get out and away from contemplating exactly this situation?

Axel seemed to pick up on his preoccupation. "If you have the time. For all I know, I could have been intruding upon your…uh…daily talk with the birds."

He sat down next to him abruptly---it didn't really matter where the confrontation was, there was no need to deliberate until the sun set; he was Sora now. It was time to start acting like it.

"Hey…" Roxas leaned towards the taller man just a bit, keeping his voice clear and measured, "It's fine. I was out walking to escape boredom; so why don't we walk together?"

Larxene had said he was a performance artist, or at least his tastes ran towards it. So he'd prefer walking to sitting still any day.

Roxas kept himself detached as he had Sora smile at Axel's immediate affirmative response.

This was going to be too easy.

* * *

"And so the next time she gave us such a worthless assignment, I refused to do it."

"You flat-out _refused?_ You just said, 'I'm not going to do it?'"

"Yeah. Yeah. There I was, and everyone's looking at the punk with the spiked hair like, of course he's going to pull some shit like this, and instead of giving her the finger and stalking out of the room, I sit down and start reading the textbook; start composing an essay."

"What did she do?"

"Well, see, that's where it gets funny. Because for the entire first half hour, she doesn't do anything. Zip, nada, nothing. And everyone's real quiet, until this kid raises his hand to ask if he can go to the bathroom---and she flies off her handle. She screamed at me, and I quoted _Walden _back to her."

"You were suspended."

"Nah, just given detention. Everyone knew she was mental. Plus, I won a five-hundred dollar contest with that essay."

The conversation stopped momentarily as Axel leaned forward to catch the rest of the floating, now nearly disintegrated puddle of whip cream in the middle of his cold hazelnut coffee.

Then his eyes jumped to Roxas's face. They'd been sitting outside at the sidewalk table watching people walk by, hurrying past dressed up like dolls in crisp black suits and toting sleek brief cases with all the tenderness one musters when holding up a newborn.

It had been…what? Forty five minutes, or so. Axel had launched into conversation as soon as they sat down on the dolled-up lawn furniture, urging Roxas to order whatever he liked.

"You can't pay for me---" He'd protested, almost letting his natural scowl shine through his indignant (shocked, even, what the hell did Axel think he was doing, paying for another _guy's _drink?) speech.

Axel would have none of it. "It's a return," he'd said cryptically, motioning for the cutely bewildered waitress to ignore Roxas's flushed objection.

"For what?" It was hard to make it a question and not a demand. For all that Roxas was confident in his acting abilities, it was tenfold more exhausting when dealing with Axel. He motioned for the waitress to disregard Axel's indication, and was disappointed to notice that his own wave wasn't nearly as effective.

_Bitch, _he thought jaggedly, when she directed her gaze only towards him in order to giggle. She found it all very amusing, no doubt, beaming from the ends of her bleached hair to the pink laces of her black work shoes.

"You ran away last time we were talking; that was somewhat awkward. This is payback, that's all."

Roxas managed to refrain from twitching, but it was a close call.

And although it was difficult for him to not immediately excuse himself to the café's restroom and fade away, he knew it wasn't prudent to return as himself so soon. If he did, then Axel would no doubt become suspicious of Sora, maybe not even desire his company again.

No, what he needed to do right now was grin and bear it. Axel needed to feel relaxed around Sora, so that in the coming days when Roxas would show up against natural rhyme and reason, he'd still trust Sora.

Well, there was that reason, and also the fact that Roxas hadn't been prepared for the meeting. He didn't have his own clothes with him. It was best to just ignore phase two of his plan for the moment. He was better at subterfuge than action, anyway.

As Roxas reigned himself in and Axel's smile grew less cautionary by the most miniscule of degrees, conversation had turned to their school days.

"But what about you?"

Axel's voice broke through Roxas's reflection.

"What about me?" He asked, as if he didn't grasp the implication of the question.

"Sora, I've been ranting about my days as the most backward student who ever walked the halls of Destiny High for half an hour. What were you like at school?"

Roxas blinked. He had been rehearsing a story during Axel's anecdotes.

"Oh, you know---model student, I was on the track team, had a lot of friends…completely normal, I suppose. Not like you."

Not like him at all. Roxas's rebellion had been silent, other than a few isolated incidents, the most heinous of which was what had ended up drawing the radical, sometimes scary Hayner to pursue his company. Roxas smiled in remembrance---Hayner had been so determined to break through his carefully constructed shell, constantly pelting him with rocks when Roxas was caught off guard, asking things like, "But what do you really think?", until the day he'd lost his cool and shouted vehemently at the class miscreant.

At the top of his lungs.

During a state-issued timed exam.

Roxas had had more than one reason for not going to college.

"…I saw that, you know."

Roxas shook himself from the slight reverie, wary at the sudden emergence of a sly tone. He tended to be wary of sudden emergences in general, and he was getting the feeling that Axel was the epitome of the unexpected. Who knew, after all, that the cool guy would have dove into a laid-back conversation about school? Not that it was laid back anymore.

"What?"

"You are a liar."

_Shit. _

The redhead's eyes were burning into his, and for a moment Roxas lingered on the fact that it was almost like he was trying to pierce through the layers of deception.

Roxas let his gaze take on a pondering aspect, but his thoughts were racing furiously.

It was a very dangerous thing to have Axel say to him; it indicated that Roxas's performance was lacking. He was letting other things drift through; he'd allowed himself to twitch and scowl and react in decidedly strange ways…

Then again, he'd never thought that Sora had to be a two-dimensional persona, had he? Perhaps this was the best thing, for Axel to perceive Sora as having a shifting personality, yes, as Axel himself was so spontaneous….not too shifting, of course…but a few layers of character could only help.

So Roxas didn't let it get to him, this bomb-shell of a statement that, if not for his (self-proclaimed and self-evaluated) top-notch skills of rationalization, would have caused him to panic.

He decided to answer as he _himself _would answer, if he didn't hate Axel and decided to forgo merely turning on his heel or shouting in favor of an answer that was civil, and, most importantly, most telling---_real. _The answer he would give Hayner.

"Everybody is."

"So I'm a liar?"

"You're a liar," Roxas confirmed. The worst there ever was, he added, thinking back on the messages he'd delivered and had yet to deliver.

"You know Sora, I meant what I said the other day."

Roxas waited for the redhead to continue, but he didn't speak again until after catching the waitress and paying for the two drinks. She seemed sorry to see them go, as if she were condemned to the renewal of ennui.

"Hey, let's go," Axel said suddenly, and grabbed Roxas's hand, tugging him out of the chair. Roxas found how very easily Axel handled his weight disturbing. It wasn't even a contest.

"Ex-excuse me?" Roxas stuttered. Axel's grip wasn't tight, per se, but it might as well have been a shackle. If he pulled away, if he made a scene---there was no _if,_ though.

Roxas found himself in the frightening position of having put himself in a situation where to maintain control, he had to give up control.

What control he was throwing away by letting----and he was definitely letting, Roxas could have gotten away, whether by jerking his hand back or sharply informing Axel that he had no intention of following him to wherever the hell he was going---himself be pulled away, and what control he was exerting at the same time----seemed suddenly all too dizzying.

He has me now, Roxas thought, frustrated. Even if he got him later---he has me now.

Roxas shook his head. This was nonsense, all of it. Nobody "_had" _anybody. He was just shocked by Axel's enthusiasm. That was it. He should be pleased.

"Sora? Are you okay?"

"I'm perfectly all right. But where are we going?"

He had barely noticed that as a pair, they'd been flying down the street, leaving a path of disgruntled pedestrians and honking cars in their wake. The street café was no longer in sight. Roxas felt as if he was swallowed by the city, penned in by the huge, towering buildings with their hundreds upon hundreds of windows.

"I don't really know."

And his life-line was a candid idiot, Roxas realized.

"Do you do this often?"

"Remain ignorant? You've no idea. Who doesn't prefer bliss?"

They moved slower now. At some point Axel had let go of Roxas, and they walked side by side at a brisk pace. Axel's face was flushed, but he seemed thoroughly pleased with himself.

It pissed Roxas off.

"That's not what I meant," he said finally, deciding to hell with diplomacy and pursuing the question.

The area they were in now was going out of downtown. The sidewalk wasn't as new, and neither were the storefronts, but it all still stank of the city.

Axel's green sweater rose quicker than normal; he was probably tired, Roxas reflected. Of course the cool guy wouldn't actually break a sweat.

"You're left-handed," Axel said. There was absolutely nothing, much like in Saix's voice when Roxas had first introduced himself as Sora, to suggest that there was anything out of the ordinary about this question.

Roxas wasn't left-handed. He knew Axel was; it was one of the things he'd first asked Larxene, back when he'd assumed that he'd have to be extremely clever to get to know Axel, instead of running into him at an art show.

And so Roxas found nothing wrong with answering simply,

"I'm not left-handed."

Axel's foot paused in the air for an instant. Roxas wasn't watching Axel's feet, and didn't notice. When the man started to speak again, it was with an entirely different tone. This one was somehow both closer to the cool guy he'd encountered for the first time in a dark club and to the cool guy who'd stood under the trees and mutely stared.

"So, Sora…you wanted to know if I do this often. I don't really take a liking to people so easily, even if most people seem to like me without any persuasion. So no. I don't often do the calling; I don't even often do the _talking. _But you were so aloof to me! I mean, it was amazing! Complete strangers, and you were more interested in the painting. And you…I mean, you acted radically different when we ran into each other, from how you talked in the gallery. So I guess my question is…do _you _do this often? Do you often just go along with some person you've only known for a day, following them when they stand up and start running? I think that's more interesting than my answer."

Roxas frowned, cataloguing the parts that were merely Axel's ego and shoving them away, focusing on what he said about Roxas himself. "So your interest in me stemmed from my disinterest in you?"

"It sounds bad when you say it like that," Axel laughed lightly. "And…like I said that night…there's something inherently interesting about you."

"No," Roxas said quietly. He found himself actively, rather than passively, despising the man.

"No what?"

"No, I don't often follow people like this. I don't go along with others. Not ever. Me? I act _on my own._"

Roxas did realize that this was pushing his act as Sora very near to the edge of a cliff. Axel had, after all, heard him speak as himself in that vehement tone that used to rule his world, instead of this calm, naïve crap he was trying to pull of late. He realized that after what he'd said about himself---being completely normal in school---this was a contradiction.

Axel blinked. Then he grinned. "Like I said…interesting. Come on, we're almost there."

What?

"I thought you said you didn't know where we were going," Roxas accused.

"I don't. But I know where we're walking to."

That was it. Fuck phase one. Roxas was itching to give Axel what he deserved. Confusion begot confusion, didn't it? Whatever he did now was fair.

"Come on, she won't bite. Not too hard, anyway. But I want you to meet her."

Roxas looked up.

And desperately wished he hadn't. He should have been paying more attention to where they were walking.

They were standing outside the bookstore, and Larxene was peering out, looking cheerfully at Axel, and very, very, confusedly at Roxas.

There was no doubt in his mind---she knew exactly who he was.

God _dammit. _

* * *

**a/n: Wow, Axel and Roxas together for the whole chapter, what the heck? Well, they really needed more time together. Umm...let's see...dialogue was extremely important in this chapter, there were a lot of metaphors, most of which I think were clear. Also, at the end of this chapter, we return to the first two words of the entire story---suggesting that Roxas has just dropped another box on his foot. Anyway,as I informed my editor, we are getting close to the second part of the summary---the "and being stalked" part. Anyway, as I'm sure you guys know, I'd love to hear from you, and the next chapter should, I hope, be up quicker than this one was.( I had college apps to take care of...) Oh! Btw, I noticed we're awfully close to 100 reviews...it'd be really cool if we got there now...**


	12. Intervention

**a/n: Hi there, this is chapter 12 of The Cool Guy. It's been a while, hasn't it? But it's here, and I hope you like it. I'd like to thank all of you who reviewed this story! It encourages me a lot. :) Also, if you're looking for an akuroku, romantic comedy that's insanely quirky, and if you've ever laughed at The Cool Guy, I recommend checking out my fic Hack Value. If you want. Entirely up to you. **

**Kingdom Hearts is the property of Square and Disney, as always. **

* * *

**Chapter Twelve**

Roxas wasn't a particularly religious person.

Actually, this was the understatement of a lifetime. Not only had he, throughout his less than idyllic childhood, _not _gone to church or engaged in any form of activity remotely related to worship, he had also on numerous occasions taken part in small acts of desecration.

No, he didn't go around burning icons, but he did assist in several annual toilet-papering sessions, and was perhaps somewhat less than cordial in his dealings with the children of the many bible thumpers that small towns seem to have a tremendous propensity for fostering.

And if Roxas equated "somewhat less than cordial" to "poorly disguised contempt bordering on hostile mockery," then who could blame him?

Except, of course, for Him, whom Roxas did not believe in nor had the slightest inclination to _want _to believe in.

And yet Roxas couldn't shake the slight suspicion that if there **was **somebody omnipotent watching him from above, then it was quite probable that they hated him, just a tiny bit. It wasn't only the past few minutes--ones of impending failure--that gave him cause to think this. No, there had been a smattering of incidents, like freckles upon the face of a redhead, all of which perhaps contributed to his key phrase in times of stress or crisis--

**God dammit. **

In light of this, it was ridiculous for him to spend his precious seconds ticking away to the discovery of his identity hoping for divine intervention.

He did it anyway, trying to look frantically around himself for something, _anything, anyone_, that could aid him, without arousing the interest of Axel, who was a mere hand's breadth away from his sleeve.

Since Axel wasn't looking at him anyway, Roxas gave up the pretense and twisted around, waiting for something to come up. For something to happen. An event, or a person, divine or otherwise. Something that would get Axel to stop. That would keep them away from Larxene, whom Roxas hadn't even suspected would be a huge liability--although thinking about it, it became obvious to him. Anyone with a gaze that sharp who had seen him before his disguise, not once but twice, would be very confused about why he was trotting about looking so different, but would no doubt not realize that Roxas very much didn't want to divulge his real name to his present company.

She was going to call his name, they weren't thirty steps from the door now, she would call "Roxas?" and it would all be over. Everything.

In his frenetic searching Roxas missed a step and stumbled against the low stone wall that ran adjacent to the sidewalk and the line of stores.

It took no more than this occurrence for hope to flood Roxas's brain, that and the idea that he must be a strange breed of masochist.

Before Axel could turn his head, and before Larxene would be able to see clearly, Roxas pulled his leg back.

Then he swung his foot forward into the stone wall with all the strength he could muster.

_**Whack**_ went the wall.

**Crikkk **went his foot.

Of course, this happened simultaneously, and the sound that resulted was rather close to someone kicking cement like they'd kick a soccer ball in fighting for the last point of a championship, but was also not unlike the sickeningly crunchy sound heard when someone or something lands after having fallen from a great height. Roxas had never heard the latter; hadn't even heard the former, but this didn't matter because in the moment of impact his vision went a little white before he teetered dizzily on the spot, resulting in his not hearing either sound with anything resembling clarity.

And Axel stopped in his tracks.

Roxas fell, disappearing beneath the heads of city-walkers and out of Larxene's line of vision, gripping his foot and grimacing.

"What the hell?" Axel dropped to one knee, green eyes flickering with confusion and concern.

"My foot!" Roxas yelped. He got a dose of concern of his own--the high pitched quality to his voice wasn't acting, as soon as he noticed how wet and sticky his sock felt, and how he, strangely, couldn't seem to feel his toes.

"What happened?!"

"My _foot!"_

"I can see that--"

"It's bleeding--"

"_Yes._ Now calm down. It's okay."

"It's bloody well _not okay!"_

"Let me have a look. Hold still."

"No!" For the life of him, Roxas couldn't keep the panic out of his voice. He knew he was supposed to be acting like Sora, but kicking the wall was supposed to be a distraction, not a horrible injury. If Axel's hand got any closer, he was going to take off his shoe and sock and Roxas did _not _want to see his toes bloody and mangled. But even more important than that, if they stayed much longer then Larxene was bound to come out of the store and see what was wrong. Roxas wasn't certain she'd noticed the situation, and if there was a chance she hadn't, then he wanted to get as far away as possible.

Not to mention that it was entirely possible that Roxas would faint, in which case Axel would undoubtedly bring him to the book store. His face paled as he imagined what sort of chat that would be, between the two of them, with him lying unconscious somewhere. He'd rather deal with his mother than have to wake up and deal with _that. _

"Please," Roxas said. Axel's hand stopped its mission, hanging in the air between them. Roxas had his back to the stone, while Axel was efficiently holding up the sidewalk. Larxene was nowhere in sight, but Roxas knew it was only a matter of moments. He had to do some fast-talking.

"Well, then let's get you into the bookstore so we can take a--"

"You can't."

Dammit, why did this guy actually have to be _logical _in a crisis? Who would have guessed?

Axel arched an eyebrow, still worried but also amused. "Then what do you suggest? I can't leave you bleeding in the middle of the street. Well. I _could, _but that'd be rather… counterproductive."

"We're on the sidewalk," Roxas corrected automatically, missing the sudden inquisitive twitch, "and I suggest you take me…" Roxas attempted to stop time with his mind. Failing that, he said the first thing he could think of. "…to your place. Now."

"Now?"

He scanned for Larxene. She was going to show up any second.

"Right now," He said firmly.

* * *

Riku tied up Ether outside the hospital before ascending the four flights of stairs for what he hoped would be somewhat close to the last time. The staff nodded their heads when they saw his feet tracing their familiar path; and a few smiled when they saw the slight spring in his step.

Who knew, after all? Maybe someday they'd see him walking with the same old swagger. But that would be a long way off, no doubt. That was why no one was particularly cheerful, but their smiles were warm enough to make him feel somewhat warm as well, and when he reached the appropriate door, which was a number 114, he pushed it open with a smile on his face.

No matter what he found inside, the smiling was important. Right from the start, from that awful beginning. He hadn't walked inside, then; he was out of breath since he'd heard the news twenty blocks away and had taken off like a shot. The long white hallway had seemed like a trip through eternity, especially since no one could confirm or deny the terrible rumor that had reached his ears. He burst inside with a stricken look and immediately replaced it with reassurance, with comfort, with something that could be leaned on. Because the rumor had been true.

He hoped to god the one that he'd heard last week was, too.

Riku closed the door quietly behind him before turning around to face the long bed with its blue-striped sheets; and the figure who was lounging against the pillow and looking meditatively through the window at the sprawling cityscape unfolded there turned his head, and smiled.

His own smile slipped for a moment. He closed his eyes; allowing himself only the space of an eye blink to regain his composure.

So it hadn't been true. So he was still in bed. It was okay. It was only a matter of time. But they'd waited for so long, the two of them. To him there was no difference between being trapped in a hospital room and being trapped in a life where they couldn't walk down the street together. Soon enough they would.

Soon.

"Riku."

Riku opened his eyes, planning on apologizing, prepared to hitch the smile back up.

But he wasn't lying on the bed, when he looked again. He was in front of him. Standing. Grinning. It had been true.

Riku smiled through his tears.

* * *

"Here, wait there, let me grab you some ice. And that shoe _is _coming off, one way or another."

Axel stared into Roxas's eyes, making sure the message sank in, before crossing swiftly through the apartment.

The apartment.

Roxas groaned. When had a cab ride ever seemed so short? How the hell were they already there?

_Here._

The den of the dragon.

The enemy camp.

The one place he should have just _stayed away from_.

And he hadn't.

And _what the hell does one way or another mean?_

Roxas sat down heavily on the sofa that graced the center of the room, calming himself even as his foot twitched and he winced. The numbness had departed; now it just hurt.

In the corner of his eye he saw Axel's shock of red hair bobbing up and down as he rummaged through what Roxas was prepared to guess was the kitchen, even though the space might as well have been an extension of the front room, judging from the stack of dishes on the low wood table, and the lack of appliances on the dull white counter.

Well, the reason was obvious, wasn't it? Axel had just moved in, after leaving the apartment Roxas now occupied. He knew from experience that sometimes unpacking wasn't the priority.

Still, the apartment had a thoroughly odd feeling to it. Roxas immediately noticed the signs of more than one person living there--the pairs of dishes, the double indentations in the couch, a shirt lying across a chair that wasn't long enough to fit Axel. Not a woman's shirt, though, Roxas noticed. Was it a roommate? Or had a lover forgotten it there? A male lover…

One way or another?

He swallowed. Sure, he was the one who made the suggestion. And he _did_ say it in a way to deliberately mislead Axel, hoping that he would take it as further incitement to get the hell away from the bookstore. But there was no reason for it to be anything more than some first aid, right? He'd just met Sora.

Hell, he'd just met Roxas!

"Are you okay?"

Roxas jumped, clearing at least three inches off the seat. Axel had entered the room without him even noticing.

"Sorry; I didn't mean to surprise you. But I was worried about the rug."

Roxas forgot to be startled and stared at Axel. "What do you mean?" He asked warily. What the hell kind of remark was that?

"If you stared at it any longer, you'd burn a hole in it."

"You're _kidding _me." Roxas said the words flatly before thinking about them. "And you're supposed to be cool?"

Had his foot not been in the condition that it was--sending jets of pain up and down his leg, contributing to a slight buzz that was in his ears and the back of his neck at the same time--Roxas would have undoubtedly stopped himself in horror, remembering the man in the dark of the club who'd so easily stepped on him.

Axel smiled, a little too tight-lipped in Roxas's opinion.

"Is that what you think of me?"

"Not at all."

Roxas watched in interest as Axel took out a small case, and picked out a slim bottle of disinfectant with elegant fingers, rather than wonder at why his answer had seemed real and fake at the same time. "I thought you were getting ice."

"Yeah. But he must have done something with it, the nut."

He.

…A boyfriend? So Axel liked girls and guys?

But he could be jumping to conclusions. It could be a roommate.

"--it off."

What?

"I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"I said take it off. Unless you want me to." The redhead was gesturing impatiently.

"What?"

What was he getting at? Did he really think Roxas was going to--

"Sora. The shoe has to come off."

"Oh." Of course. "Sorry, yeah…" Roxas sneaked a look at Axel while he bent down and undid his laces--was it his imagination, or were those damned curious eyes of his flickering in amusement?

Who the hell did he think he was? If he thought Roxas was interested in him, he had another thing coming.

Other than the whole message thing.

But that was necessity.

It wasn't like he could have walked away.

And it wasn't like the goddamned redhead was attractive enough to think Roxas would be charmed with someone like him, anyway.

Roxas gasped suddenly. Axel had knelt down in front of him and upon touching his foot, sent a thrill of pain up his spine.

"Don't touch it!"

"Hold still," Axel snapped, apparently out of patience. Roxas held still out of shock. It was the first time he'd heard him talk like that. So even Axel wasn't calm all the time. It was an interesting thing to know.

His foot was striped down from the toes with lines of blood. He'd broken open the skin towards the top of his foot, and it was also swelling. Roxas mutely watched as Axel wiped away the blood with a wet cloth, then swabbed the wound itself with the disinfectant stuff from the bottle. The smell was strong and made him queasy, and it felt like he was setting his foot on fire.

"Well, it's not as bad as I thought. I mean Christ, Sora, I still don't get what the hell happened back there. It doesn't look like any of your toes are broken, but I don't really recommend walking on it quite yet," Axel said, taking a length of white gauze from the case. He started wrapping, quickly and efficiently.

Roxas was surprised. Under normal circumstances he'd never let someone do all this for him, of course, but Axel had done a remarkably good job.

Of course, why should he be surprised? He knew next to nothing about Axel.

"Okay. Now do you feel like telling me how this happened, anyway?" Axel sat cross-legged on the floor, not looking at Roxas as he threw the remaining gauze back in the case and snapped it shut with a loud click.

"I tripped." Roxas picked up his sock and shoved it inside his shoe. It was the pair he'd bought the other day; sleek in design with a white stripe down the side. He balanced it in his hand and cast a glance at the redhead.

His green eyes were hard.

Roxas hadn't expected him to believe it, he was obviously too sharp for that.

"Man's gotta try, right?" He asked, casting about for another excuse.

"It's okay. I understand your situation exactly." Axel nodded knowingly.

"You do?" What did he mean?

"For me, it was the girl's bathroom."

Roxas stared at him.

"Crazy, right? I know. But it's true. I did it for years."

Axel leaned forward, speaking loudly, almost excitedly, like he was sharing something great. Roxas tried to lean backwards, but he was up against the sofa cushion with nowhere to go.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"It's okay, you don't have to hide it. Because trust me, it won't last forever."

"No, I don't understand what you mean…"

"One day I walked right in. No qualms at all. Someday you will too."

"I will not!" Roxas said, indignant, in his haste leaning forward.

Axel blinked. His mouth twisted confusedly. "Really? Ya think? Why?"

"Because I'm not a pervert!"

A thick silence settled between them.

And then Axel started laughing. His laughter was clear. It was loud, without being annoying; it was also of the infectious sort, and if Roxas hadn't been so utterly disturbed he would have joined in. It was easy to tell, from that laugh, how people were attracted him.

"I'm not a pervert either, not if you're open-minded, anyway. I guess we could talk about that, but isn't that a little off topic?" Axel finally stopped, snickering once before rubbing his face and looking up.

"But you were the one who--"

"All I meant was to not worry. I used to have an irrational fear of walking into girl's bathrooms. Well, not entirely irrational--it all started this one day, when Larxene--well, it's not important. But don't worry, I understand that intense dislike of certain places. That's all I'm saying."

"I…"

"If you didn't want to walk into the bookstore, you should have said something. I'd have just called her over… You didn't have to go to that extreme."

Roxas gaped. Axel couldn't seriously think he had an irrational fear of bookstores…no one had a fear of bookstores, for crying out loud. And yet, that had been his emotion of the moment, hadn't it?

"…yeah. Er, yes. Thanks for your…help…consideration…philosophy?"

Axel laughed again."You're something else."

Roxas watched him, looking over the top of his freshly bandaged foot.

"Maybe you're right," he said quietly.

It wasn't that he didn't feel like giving Axel what he deserved anymore.

He just wasn't sure of what it was he deserved.

"Sora."

Sora. That was right. Messages. Axel being a horrible person. His job. The clipboard was at the apartment…

"I need to be going. Now." Roxas stood up, testing his foot gingerly. It would be fine. He couldn't really put the shoe back on without hurting his toes, but that was okay; his apartment couldn't be too far away from Axel's.

"You won't make it very far on that," Axel called suddenly when Roxas had his hand on the doorknob.

He turned, smoothing over the annoyance in his voice. "Yes I will. I don't live so far away that I'll collapse before I get there."

"Sora, you're breathing shallowly and if your face gets much paler then you'll scare people on the street. Just stay here, I'll take you home later. All right? I don't need your death on my conscience because you faint while trying to cross the street."

"I don't faint," Roxas said matter-of-factly. He could feel the scowl creeping across his face. "Besides, why do you care?"

"Why do I care?" Axel repeated. He crossed the room and was next to Roxas in three strides. Roxas had to tilt his head in order to meet his eyes; he only came up to the green collar of Axel's sweater.

"Like I said--you're interesting. More than that--lots of people are interesting, but they're still people that you'd never want to know about. You're _different_."

"You don't mean that," Roxas said, infuriated once more.

"You keep saying that, but you rescue paintings. You talk to _pigeons. _You kick walls, because you have a fear of bookstores, or maybe you just hate walls, I don't know. See? _I don't know._"

Roxas forced a smile across his face. Axel was blocking the door now, and he had no way of leaving the apartment short of shoving him out of the way. He was sturdier than the tall, thin man, but the hint of wiry muscles in his arms gave Roxas second thoughts. He might have been slender but there was also power behind his frame, and he didn't want to think about how mortifying it would be if he couldn't actually accomplish the task.

This left him at a stalemate.

They stared at each other--

Deep green eyes, flickering with a million things that Roxas found both distasteful and highly suspect, silently fought with brilliant blue irises, which were unwavering and contained a peculiar light that Axel couldn't help but be curious about, and fascinated with.

On the flipside, something in Axel's brain clicked with the light of the setting sun that was falling golden through the window, and if he could only remember, he'd have found something highly suspect in the blue gaze; and Roxas likewise would have admitted to himself--if he weren't Roxas, that is, or maybe just if he didn't have to be Sora--that the gleam of green held something very curious indeed.

Roxas did, however, know enough about books and movies to know that at a junction like this, anything could happen.

He also knew enough about kisses to clearly identify that Axel was not trying to strangle him as he bent down and swept Roxas's hair out of the way, but kiss him.

And he knew more than enough about failure to recognize it when the door was flung open from the other side, catching the side of Axel's head rather neatly, before their lips even touched.

Demyx stepped through the door, gaping at Axel, who was three feet away and clutching his head with his eyes scrunched shut.

Roxas didn't waste the opportunity, didn't check to see if anyone followed, didn't question Demyx's entrance or why he would be there.

He took off like a shot. The jarring ache as his foot slapped the concrete was nothing, nothing to him, as he ran with his heart beating entirely too fast, his breath much too shallow, and his face, so pale the previous moment, impossibly red.

* * *

**a/n: So much rewriting. Ah, oh well. I'm still not really sure if I actually like this chapter! What do you guys think about it? Don't worry if the hospital thing seems random to you; that's been planned since...oh...the third chapter? Theories, anybody? Also, who else thinks parts of Axel's bathroom rant could have been metaphor? Any takers? Also, is Roxas gay, anyway? Lots of questions...anyway, I think I might have promised stalking in this chapter, but I underestimated my own transition. This is a more, turning-the-tables chapter, as we see Axel's interest in Roxas and Roxas's...crazy rantings in his head. **

**I think Xigbar should be in the next chapter. Anyway, comments, questions, concerns? I'd love to hear them. I think chapter thirteen will actually be written quickly. **


	13. Epiphany

**a/n: Hello and welcome to Chapter 13 of The Cool Guy. I honestly though this would never be finished (lies on my profile, people. Lies) but here it is, and I think there'll be one or two, maybe three chapters after this. KH does not belong to me. I hope you enjoy the chapter.**

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**Chapter Thirteen**

By now Roxas's shirt was drenched through with sweat, and his upper arms were beginning to ache, but the thundering in his chest and the buzzing that permeated near his head refused him respite: he was busily throwing his possessions back into their packing boxes, stuffing clothes and sheets and books into the pile without caution; his fingers were shaking too much for the neat folds he'd normally employ. Finally a painted blue china saucer slipped through his slack grip, shattering against the edge of the table, and he threw himself against the closest surface of wall, using one arm to support him and pressing the other against his forehead as his anxiety climbed.

Forcing himself to breathe evenly was a chore--- he couldn't help the ragged pace. Every time he thought about Axel (which was about once every thirty seconds) he was left gasping. What if Demyx hadn't bursted in at the last moment? What was Demyx doing there? Why had he let things go so far? In addition to his frenzied thoughts, he was thoroughly aware that he'd worsened the condition of his foot threefold during his escape.

His foot. Oh god. The pain had only just begun to bother him again, and even now it seemed a little faraway, but he was not looking forward to how it would feel when he was thoroughly calm---if he ever was again.

He sighed---he wasn't thinking straight. Somewhat reluctantly he left his post at the wall and stepped gingerly to the medicine cabinet in his tiny bathroom, and downed a few painkillers. He spared himself only a glance in the mirror, but it confirmed his suspicions---he looked like hell. Interestingly, he seemed caught between disguises, having cast Sora into disarray throughout the afternoon. He squinted, hands gripping the porcelain sink loosely. A weary smile cracked his face: he couldn't tell which he looked like. He wasn't quite in the persona of Sora, but neither did he seem to be the person he'd been only a few days ago.

When was the last time he'd changed himself, Roxas wondered. He'd always thought he was good enough, hadn't he? He was always above everything. Sure, his aloofness had helped that sentiment. But he'd also considered himself…more. More intelligent. More ambitious. But mostly, more _interesting. _

How cruel had Axel's remarks actually been? No one had ever said something like that to him, sure, but it wasn't like it was the first time he'd gotten chewed out.

But…

It was the first time someone had accused him of not being the thing, growing up in a homogenous small town, desperately searching for a way to identify himself, he had treasured most.

It was the reason he'd left his home. It was the reason he'd never went to college, and it was the reason he'd met his best friend. It was why he talked to paintings and why he walked like he meant it, and it was the one thing that, being isolated so thoroughly and for so long from his peers, he took refuge in.

And Axel hadn't known that. That was why it had burned, had driven him to distraction---why he needed so much, not to give as good as he'd gotten, but to show him he was wrong.

And he was being too arrogant, too egotistical for the entire time, to see that, and to understand---that if he wanted to show Axel how interesting he was, all he had to do was replay the day in his head. Days. Because it wasn't like he could just become a different person at will.

Sora only knew about wit and courage and paintings because Roxas did.

Roxas shook his head, catching sight of the packing boxes through the doorway.

He had some cleaning up to do.

* * *

Before he had managed to unpack even one box, having stopped first to change his clothes, eat his first nutritious meal in days, and acquire a new icepack for his foot, the phone rang.

Roxas eyed it guiltily. There were only two people who would be calling him, and he wasn't ready to talk to either of them.

He listened to the click, and then the buzz of the answering machine. "Hey. I know you're there, Rox; so talk to me before I decide to---"

"Hayner!" Roxas stumbled to the phone, and grinned.

"Way to drop off the face of the earth, man."

"I needed the change of scenery. And pace. And perception."

"So how've your first days been? Anything exciting?" The wry voice was obviously aware of his mother's panic and expected a story of some sort.

"How much time do you have?" Roxas leaned easily into the sofa, opening the window with one hand so as to feel the cool evening breeze on his face.

Hayner only snorted into the phone; he wasn't in the habit of talking unless he had hours on end to do so. He was like that.

Roxas smiled. "Okay, then I'll start at the beginning. The first person I met was a man like a pirate, and he was absolutely intent on evicting me, because he thought I was someone else…"

Hayner remained silent through the bulk of the story, which was told with far more amusement than Roxas had thought. When he explained how he'd spent a night in the street he heard a small sound of consternation, and also some murmured appreciation when Roxas spoke of the huge runaway dog in the museum.

By the time Roxas was through the sky had long been black outside and he was almost certain Hayner had nodded off. But after a moment of silence he heard his friend suck in a large breath and sigh loudly.

Roxas waited patiently for the verdict, absently prodding his foot. It wasn't hurting too badly anymore.

"How many girlfriends have you had, Rox?"

Roxas froze.

"You're shocked." Hayner sounded almost apologetic.

"It's just not what I was expecting. I figured you'd say something like…well, I don't know, but something about how completely out of character the whole comedy of errors thing is, and how gullible it is of me to think that I can actually disguise myself."

Hayner chuckled, not a drop of the uncertainty Xigbar had about the whole thing in his laugh.

"No, Rox. I know you know that there aren't people alive that stupid. What you've got is a group of people who know you by the name Roxas and a group of people who've been told your name is Sora and probably a couple of people who are wondering if you go by your middle name part of the time, or what. The illusion, what makes it seem plausible, is that you've only been around these people a couple of days, and they're not well connected. Sounds like one of those really complicated groups of acquaintances. Axel may have been drunk that night and forgot what you look like, or maybe…well, I won't tell you what you already know."

Roxas stared out the window. "I'm being ridiculous, aren't I?" He asked, barely audible.

"No," Hayner said firmly in his ear. "You were presented with a problem and felt like you had to show a new face to the client. Plus, it sounds like everyone over there is insane. You were doing creative problem solving and they, if you noticed, were all so wrapped up in their lives that no one could tell you to calm down and go meet the guy properly.

"Instead you're closest to the pirate guy who hates Axel's guts and dramatizes everything, you caught the attention of an editor who would love, I'm sure, to get his hands on your real life case of the city-anonymity-induced comedy of errors and thusly made you paranoid about _absolutely nothing_, you decided to work for a psychotic employer simply because you were feeling depressed and helpless and he instilled in you, again, the belief that Axel is a terrible guy because of his own vendetta and---let's face it---the only reason he hires a messenger is because he can't stand the guy and he likes to freak the hell out of people with his blonde haired buddy by telling them that bullshit story about how you need to be a well trained stalker to get the job done, and you've been so caught up in self doubt and the fear that when you tell Axel you were trying to impress him that he'll decide to _hate_ you you haven't looked too closely at all about why that really really bothers you, why you can tell me the exact shade of his eyes, and why your mum sounds the tiniest bit sarcastic when she asks if you've found a girlfriend yet!"

Roxas held the receiver six inches away from his ear when Hayner's voice rose to a hoarse yell. Then he dropped the phone. Then he picked it up. Then he considered dropping the phone again just to focus on something other than the words of his best friend.

"…Roxas? All right over there? It's just an outsider's point of view—"

"You're right. I've never _had_ a girlfriend, Hayner, I don't even look at girls. I figured I didn't have much libido, god damn me, that eventually…when I found the _right _one…but I didn't care about when or who."

Roxas looked at his feet, remembering how he felt when he saw the shirt that obviously wasn't Axel's. Everything Hayner said about Marluxia, Xigbar, and Saix…well, at least that didn't come down to his ignorance of his own sexual orientation.

"So you actually meant yes. I have been ridiculous." Roxas laughed.

"Well, yeah. You're just that kind of guy. You knew you were going to get chewed out for this at some point, right?"

Roxas smiled. Then spluttered. "Wait a minute. My mum? Sarcastic? You mean she _knows?_"

There was a shuffling sound and Roxas knew Hayner was putting his hands in the air. "I'm only telling you how I hear it, when she says it. Wistful, yes. Bit pathetic actually, and then you see that flicker of a smile, and it starts to make sense."

"What, you two get together now?"

"Just over breakfast the other day, to talk about you. The way she talks I half expected you to be tied in a closet when I called. Said you sounded "strained" when you talked to her. I figured I'd wait a week or two but just look at what you've managed over the course of a few days. It's just like that time over Thanksgiving break with the feathers and two dozen copies of _The Catcher in The Rye_---"

"Okay, okay. Geez, Hayner, I was just starting to forget about that."

"The point is, you've done stuff like this before. Not quite like this, and not in this muddled, manipulative sort of capacity, but still."

"I just ran away from the only person who's ever seen me in a remotely romantic way. I've been parading around lying to people, believed people who I just met and cemented that belief because I got told off in a club by a stranger. My toes are broken, I spent hours indulging the whims of a selfish flower seller, I may appear in a journal article that will have people laughing at me for who knows how long… So it's just like highschool, really. And not, at the same time. Because this time instead of getting tangled up in and manipulated by ideas, which is what it always was, it's people. I got involved with people. Plural. I made connections. That's…new stuff for me."

"You know what you have to do, don't you?" Hayner asked gently.

"Yeah. I do. I was just starting to come to that conclusion, before you called."

"Let me know how everything turns out. I'm gonna get some sleep now, and I suggest you do the same."

"Good night, then. And thanks."

Roxas hung up the phone and stretched. It had been a _really _long day, and he wanted nothing more right now than the comfort of sheets that still smelled like home. By the time he curled up for the night, though, he'd taken out the trash; contacts and hair dye inside.

* * *

**a/n: I hope this doesn't sound like I'm trying to wrap things up quickly, because I'm not. I had intended for this to play out a bit more but then I realized Roxas is too rational to not think things through and realize he's been caught up in the motivations of others**. **Plus, well, Axel has been growing on him for the past few chapters, and I think I had enough internal dialogue in previous chapters that this all makes sense. There is still plenty of action to come---this, after all, is only Roxas's internal resolution**. **I think any outsider would come to Hayner's decisive ruling; and in fact I might be poking fun at myself with his reaction to the plot. **

** Yes, Marluxia and Larxene just like to mess with people. For the most part.  
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** Of course, you can feel free to be tremendously angry with how I'm handling things. If you are, send me a review! If you're not, send me a review anyway. **

** Thanks so much for reading.  
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